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THE DOCTOR'S DILEMMA, 
( ETTING MARRIED, AND 
IHE SHEWING-UP OF 
DLANCO POSNET 



BERNARD SHAW'S BOOKS 



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THE DOCTOR'S DILEMMA, 
GETTING MARRIED, AND 
THE SHEWING- UPOF 
BLANCO POSNET • BY BER- 
NARD SHAW 




BRENTANO'S • NEW YORK 
MCMXI 



Copyright, 1909, hy Brentand's 
Copyright, 1911, by G. Bernard Shaw 



THB TROW FBESB • NEW TORE 



©CI.A283098 



CONTENTS 



The Doctor's Dilemma: a Tragedy 



Preface on Doctors .... 
Doubtful Character borne by the 

Medical Profession 
Doctors' Consciences 
The Peculiar People . 
Recoil of the Dogma of Medical In 

fallibility on the Doctor . 
Why Doctors do not Differ 
The Craze for Operations 
Credulity and Chloroform 
Medical Poverty 
The Successful Doctor 
The Psychology of Self-Respect in 

Surgeons 

Are Doctors Men of Science? . 
Bacteriology as a Superstition . 
Economic Difficulties of Immiiniza 

tion 

The Perils of Inoculation. 

Trade Unionism and Science 

Doctors and Vivisection 

The Primitive Savage Motive . 

The Higher Motive. The Tree of 

Knowledge .... 
The Flaw in the Argument 
Limitations of the Right to Know 

ledge 



VI 

viii 
ix 

xi 
xiv 

XV 

xvii 
xviii 

XX 

xxii 
xxiv 
xxvi 

xxix 
xxxi 

xxxiv 
xxxvi 
xxxvii 

xxxix 
xl 



xU 



Contents 



of 



A False Alternative . 
Cruelty for its own Sake . 
Our Own Cruelties 
The Scientific Investigation 

Cruelty 

Suggested Laboratory Tests of the 

Vivisector's Emotions . 
Routine .... 
The Old Line between Man and 

Beast 

Vivisecting the Human Subject 
" The Lie is a European Power " 
An Argument which would Defend 

any Crime 
Thou Art the Man . 
What the Public Wants and Will 

Not Get ... 

The Vaccination Craze 
Statistical Illusions . 
The Surprises of Attention and 

Neglect 

Stealing Credit from Civilization 
Biometrika .... 

Patient-made Therapeutics 
The Reforms also come from the 

Laity . . . > 
Fashions and Epidemics . 
The Doctor's Virtues 
The Doctor's Hardships . 
The Public Doctor . 
Medical Organization 
The Social Solution of the Medical 

Problem .... 

The Future of Private Practice 
The Technical Problem . 
The Latest Theories 



xlii 
xliv 
xlv 

xlvii 

xlviii 
xlix 

Hii 

liv 

Iv 

Ivii 
Ix 

Ixi 
Ixi 
Ixii 

Ixv 
Ixvii 
Ixix 

Ixx 

Ixxi 
Ixxii 
Ixxii 
Ixxiii 
Ixxvi 
Ixxvii 

Ixxix 

Ixxx 

Ixxxii 

Ixxxvi 



Contents 



Getting Married: a Comedy . 

Preface — The Revolt against Marriage 
Marriage Nevertheless Inevitable 
What does the Word Marriage Mean 
Survivals of Sex Slavery 
The New Attack on Marriage 
A Forgotten Conference of Married 

Men 

Hearth and Home . . > 

Too Much of a Good Thing 

Large and Small Families . 

The Gospel of Laodicea 

For Better For Worse 

Wanted: an Immoral Statesman . 

The Limits of Democracy . 

The Science and Art of Politics . 

Why Statesmen Shirk the Marriage 

Question 

The Question of Population 
The Right to Motherhood . 
Monogamy, Polygyny, and Polyandry 
The Male Revolt against Polygyny 
Difference between Oriental and Occi 

dental Polygyny 
The Old Maid's Right to Motherhood 
Ibsen's Chain Stitch 
Remoteness of the Facts from the Ideal 
Difficulty of Obtaining Evidence 
Marriage as a Magic Spell 
The Impersonality of Sex . 
The Economic Slavery of Women 
Unpopularity of Impersonal Views 
Impersonality is not Promiscuity 
Domestic Change of Air 
Home Manners are Bad Manners 



. 117 



119 
120 
121 
123 
126 

127 
131 
134 
135 
136 
139 
141 
143 
144 

145 
146 
148 
149 
150 

151 
153 
154 
156 
157 
159 
160 
163 
164 
165 
166 
168 



Contciits 

Spurious " Natural " Affection . .168 
Carrying the War into the Enemy's 

Country 170 

Shelley and Queen Victoria . . 171 

A Probable Effect of Giving Women 

the Vote 172 

The Personal Sentimental Basis of 

Monogamy 173 

Divorce 177 

Importance of Sentimental Grievances 179 
Divorce Without Asking Why . .180 
Economic Slavery again the Root 

Difficulty 182 

Labor Exchanges and the White 

Slavery 182 

Divorce Favorable to Marriage . .184 
Male Economics and the Rights of 

Bachelors 186 

The Pathology of Marriage . .189 

The Criminology of Marriage . .191 

Does it Matter.? 192 

Christian Marriage . . . .193 
Divorce a Sacramental Duty . .195 
Othello and Desdemona . . .196 
What is to become of the Children? . 198 
The Cost of Divorce . . . .203 
Conclusions 204< 

The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet: a 

Melodrama 300 

Preface— The Censorship . . .323 
A Readable Bluebook . . . .323 
How Not to Do it . . . . 324 
The Story of The Joint Select Com- 
mittee 327 



Contents 

Why the Managers Love the Censor- 
ship 328 

A Two Guinea Insurance Policy . 330 
Why the Government Interfered . 331 
The Peers on the Joint Select Com- 
mittee 333 

The Committee's Attitude toward the 

Theatre 334 

A Bad Beginning ..... 334 

A Comic Interlude .... 336 

An Anti-Shavian Panic . . . 337 

A Rare and Curious First Edition . 338 

The Times to the Rescue . . . 339 
The Council of Ten . . . .340 

The Sentence 341 

The Execution ..... 342 
The Rejected Statement — The Witness's 

Qualifications ..... 345 

The Definition of Immorality . . 346 
What Toleration means . . .349 

The Case for Toleration . . . 350 

The Limits to Toleration . . . 352 
The Difference between Law and 

Censorship 354 

Why the Lord Chamberlain,? . . 358 
The Diplomatic Objection to the Lord 

Chamberlain ..... 359 
The Objection of Court Etiquet . . 360 
Why not an Enlightened Censorship.'' 36l 
The Weakness of the Lord Chamber- 
lain's Department .... 364 
An Enlightened Censorship still Worse 

than the Lord Chamberlain's . . 366 
The Practical Impossibilities of Cen- 
sorship 368 

The Arbitration Proposal . . . 371 



Contents 

The Licensing of Theatres — The Dis- 
tinction between Licensing and Cen- 
sorship 

Prostitution and Drink in Theatres 
Why the Managers dread Local 
Control 



373 
374. 

376 

Desirable Limitations of Local Control 377 

381 

385 
387 
388 
390 
390 
391 
394 
396 
398 
400 
401 



Summary of the Rejected Statement 
Preface Resumed — Mr. George Alex 
ander's Protest .... 
Eliza and Her Bath 
A King's Proctor .... 
Counsel's Opinion 
Wanted: A New Magna Charta 
Proposed: A New Star Chamber 
Possibilities of the Proposal 
Star Chamber Sentimentality 
Anything for a Quiet Life . 
Shall the Examiner of Plays Starve 
Lord Gorell's Awakening 



Judges : Their Professional Limitations 403 

Conclusion 403 

Postscript 405 



PREFACE ON DOCTORS 

It is not the fault of our doctors that the medical service 
of the community, as at present provided for, is a mur- 
derous absurdity. That any sane nation, having ob- 
served that you could provide for the supply of bread by 
giving bakers a pecuniary interest in baking for you, 
should go on to give a surgeon a pecuniary interest in 
cutting off your leg, is enough to make one despair of 
political humanity. But that is precisely what we have 
done. And the more appalling the mutilation, the more 
the mutilator is paid. He who corrects the ingrowing 
toe-nail receives a few shillings: he who cuts your inside 
out receives hundreds of guineas, except when he does it 
to a poor person for practice. 

Scandalized voices murmur that these operations are 
necessary. They may be. It may also be necessary to 
hang a man or pull down a house. But we take good 
care not to make the hangman and the housebreaker the 
judges of that. If we did, no man's neck would be safe 
and no man's house stable. But we do' make the doctor 
the judge, and fine him anything from sixpence to sev- 
eral hundred guineas if he decides in our favor. I can- 
not knock my shins severely without forcing on some 
surgeon the difficult question, " Could I not make a 
better use of a pocketful of guineas than this man is 
making of his leg? Could he not write as well — or even 
better — on one leg than on two ? And the guineas would 



vi The Doctor's Dilemma 

make all the difference in the world to me just now. 
My wife — my pretty ones — the leg may mortify — it is 
always safer to operate — he will be well in a fortnight 
— artificial legs are now so well made that they are 
really better than natural ones — evolution is towards 
motors and leglessness, &c., &c., &c." 

Now there is no calculation that an engineer can make 
as to the behavior of a girder under a strain, or an 
astronomer as to the recurrence of a comet, more certain 
than the calculation that under such circumstances we 
shall be dismembered unnecessarily in all directions by 
surgeons who believe the operations to be necessary 
solely because they want to perform them. The process 
metaphorically called bleeding the rich man is performed 
not only metaphorically but literally every day by sur- 
geons who are quite as honest as most of us. After all, 
what harm is there in it? The surgeon need not take 
off the rich man's (or woman's) leg or arm: he can 
remove the appendix or the uvula, and leave the patient 
none the worse after a fortnight or so in bed, whilst the 
nurse, the general practitioner, the apothecary, and the 
surgeon will be the better. 

Doubtful Character borne by the Medical 
Profession 

Again I hear the voices indignantly muttering old 
phrases about the high character of a noble profession 
and the honor and conscience of its members. I must 
reply that the medical profession has not a high char- 
acter: it has an infamous character. I do not know a 
single thoughtful and well-informed person who does not 
feel that the tragedy of illness at present is that it de- 
livers you helplessly into the hands of a profession 
which you deeply mistrust, because it not only advocates 
and practises the most revolting cruelties in the pursuit 



Preface on Doctors vii 

of knowledge, and justifies them on grounds which would 
equally justify practising the same cruelties on your- 
self or your children, or burning down London to test 
a patent fire extinguisher, but, when it has shocked the 
public, tries to reassure it with lies of breath-bereaving 
brazenness. That is the character the medical profes- 
sion has got just now. It may be deserved or it may 
not: there it is at all events, and the doctors who have 
not realized this are living in a fool's paradise. As to 
the honor and conscience of doctors, they have as much 
as any other class of men, no more and no less. And 
what other men dare pretend to be impartial where they 
have a strong pecuniary interest on one side? Nobody 
supposes that doctors are less virtuous than judges; 
but a judge whose salary and reputation depended on 
whether the verdict was for plaintiff or defendant, 
prosecutor or prisoner, would be as little trusted as a 
general in the pay of the enemy. To offer me a doctor 
as my judge, and then weight his decision with a bribe 
of a large sum of money and a virtual guarantee that if 
he makes a mistake it can never be proved against him, 
is to go wildly beyond the ascertained strain which 
human nature will bear. It is simply unscientific to 
allege or believe that doctors do not under existing cir- 
cumstances perform unnecessary operations and manu- 
facture and prolong lucrative illnesses. The only ones 
who can claim to be above suspicion are those who are 
so much sought after that their cured patients are im- 
mediately replaced by fresh ones. And there is this 
curious psychological fact to be remembered: a serious 
illness or a death advertizes the doctor exactly as a 
hanging advertizes the barrister who defended the per- 
son hanged. Suppose, for example, a royal personage 
gets something wrong with his throat, or has a pain 
in his inside. If a doctor effects some trumpery cure 
with a wet compress or a peppermint lozenge nobody 



viii The Doctor's Dilemma 

takes the least notice of him. But if he operates on 
the throat and kills the patient, or extirpates an in- 
ternal organ and keeps the whole nation palpitating for 
days whilst the patient hovers in pain and fever between 
life and death, his fortune is made: every rich man who 
omits to call him in when the same symptoms appear in 
his household is held not to have done his utmost duty 
to the patient. The wonder is that there is a king or 
queen left alive in Europe. 

Doctor's Consciences 

There is another difficulty in trusting to the honor and 
conscience of a doctor. Doctors are just like other 
Englishmen: most of them have no honor and no con- 
science: what they commonly mistake for these is sen- 
timentality and an intense dread of doing anything that 
everybody else does not do, or omitting to do anything 
that everybody else does. This of course does amount 
to a sort of working or rule-of-thumb conscience; but 
it means that you will do anything, good or bad, pro- 
vided you get enough people to keep you in countenance 
by doing it also. It is the sort of conscience that makes 
it possible to keep order on a pirate ship, or in a troop 
of brigands. It may be said that in the last analysis 
there is no other sort of honor or conscience in existence 
— that the assent of the majority is the only sanction 
known to ethics. No doubt this holds good in political 
practice. If mankind knew the facts, and agreed with 
the doctors, then the doctors would be in the right; and 
any person who thought otherwise would be a lunatic. 
But mankind does not agree, and does not know the 
facts. All that can be said for medical popularity is 
that until there is a practicable alternative to blind trust 
in the doctor, the truth about the doctor is so terrible 
that we dare not face it. Moliere saw through the doc- 



Preface on Doctors ix 

tors; but he had to call them in just the same. Napoleon 
had no illusions about them; but he had to die xinder 
their treatment just as much as the most credulous 
ignoramus that ever paid sixpence for a bottle of strong 
medicine. In this predicament most people, to save 
themselves from unbearable mistrust and misery, or from 
being driven by their conscience into actual conflict with 
the law, fall back on the old rule that if you cannot 
have what you believe in you must believe in what you 
have. When your child is ill or your wife dying, and 
you happen to be very fond of them, or even when, if 
you are not fond of them, you are human enough to 
forget every personal grudge before the spectacle of a 
fellow creature in pain or peril, what you want is com- 
fort, reassurance, something to clutch at, were it but a 
straw. This the doctor brings you. You have a wildly 
urgent feeling that something must be done; and the 
doctor does something. Sometimes what he does kills 
the patient; but you do not know that; and the doctor 
assures you that all that human skill could do has been 
done. And nobody has the brutality to say to the newly 
bereft father, mother, husband, wife, brother, or sister, 
" You have killed your lost darling by your credulity." 

The Peculiar People 

Besides, the calling in of the doctor is now compulsory 
except in cases where the patient is an adult and not too 
ill to decide the steps to be taken. We are subject to 
prosecution for manslaughter or for criminal neglect if 
the patient dies without the consolations of the medical 
profession. This menace is kept before the public by 
the Peculiar People. The Peculiars, as they are called, 
have gained their name by believing that the Bible is 
infallible, and taking their belief quite seriously. The 
Bible is very clear as to the treatment of illness. The 



X The Doctor's Dilemma 

Epistle of James^ chapter v., contains the following ex- 
plicit directions: 

14. Is any sick among you? let him call for the 
elders of the Church; and let them pray over him, 
anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord: 

15. And the prayer of faith shall save the sick, 
and the Lord shall raise him up; and if he have 
committed sins, they shall be forgiven him. 

The Peculiars obey these instructions and dispense with 
doctors. They are therefore prosecuted for manslaugh- 
ter when their children die. 

When I was a young man, the Peculiars were usually 
acquitted. The prosecution broke down when the doc- 
tor in the witness box was asked whether, if the child 
had had medical attendance, it would have lived. It 
was, of course, impossible for any man of sense and 
honor to assume divine omniscience by answering this in 
the affirmative, or indeed pretending to be able to an- 
swer it at all. And on this the judge had to instruct 
the jury that they must acquit the prisoner. Thus a 
judge with a keen sense of law (a very rare phenomenon 
on the Bench, by the way) was spared the possibility 
of having to sentence one prisoner (under the Blas- 
phemy Laws) for questioning the authority of Scripture, 
and another for ignorantly and superstitiously accepting 
it as a guide to conduct. To-day all this is changed. 
The doctor never hesitates to claim divine omniscience, 
nor to clamor for laws to punish any scepticism on the 
part of laymen. A modern doctor thinks nothing of 
signing the death certificate of one of his own diphtheria 
patients, and then going into the witness box and swear- 
ing a Peculiar into prison for six months by assuring 
the jury, on oath, that if the prisoner's child, dead of 
diphtheria, had been placed under his treatment instead 
of that of St. James, it would not have died. And he 
does so not only with impunity, but with public ap- 



Preface on Doctors xi 

plause, though the logical course would be to prosecute 
him either for the murder of his own patient or for 
perjury in the case of St. James. Yet no barrister, 
apparently, dreams of asking for the statistics of the 
relative case-mortality in diphtheria among the Peculiars 
and among the believers in doctors, on which alone any 
valid opinion could be founded. The barrister is as 
superstitious as the doctor is infatuated ; and the Peculiar 
goes unpitied to his cell, though nothing whatever has 
been proved except that his child does without the inter- 
ference of a doctor as effectually as any of the hundreds 
of children who die every day of the same diseases in 
the doctor's care. 

Recoil of the Dogma of Medical Infallibility 
on the Doctor 

On the other hand, when the doctor is in the dock, or 
is the defendant in an action for malpractice, he has to 
struggle against the inevitable result of his former pre- 
tences to infinite knowledge and unerring skill. He has 
taught the jury and the judge, and even his own coim- 
sel, to believe that every doctor can, with a glance at 
the tongue, a touch on the pulse, and a reading of the 
clinical thermometer, diagnose with absolute certainty a 
patient's complaint, also that on dissecting a dead body 
he can infalliby put his finger on the cause of death, 
and, in cases where poisoning is suspected, the nature 
of the poison used. Now all this supposed exactness 
and infallibility is imaginary; and to treat a doctor as 
if his mistakes were necessarily malicious or corrupt 
malpractices (an inevitable deduction from the postulate 
that the doctor, being omniscient, cannot make mistakes) 
is as unjust as to blame the nearest apothecary for not 
being prepared to supply you with sixpenny-worth of 
the elixir of life, or the nearest motor garage for not 



xii The Doctor's Dilemma 

having perpetual motion on sale in gallon tins. But if 
apothecaries and motor car makers habitually advertized 
elixir of life and perpetual motion, and succeeded in 
creating a strong general belief that they could supply 
it, they would find themselves in an awkward position 
if they were indicted for allowing a customer to die, 
or for burning a chauffeur by putting petrol into his 
car. That is the predicament the doctor finds himself 
in when he has to defend himself against a charge of 
malpractice by a plea of ignorance and fallibility. His 
plea is received with flat credulity; and he gets little 
sympathy, even from laymen who know, because he has 
brought the incredulity on himself. If he escapes, he 
can only do so by opening the eyes of the jury to the 
facts that medical science is as yet very imperfectly 
differentiated from common curemongering witchcraft; 
that diagnosis, though it means in many instances (in- 
cluding even the identification of pathogenic bacilli un- 
der the microscope) only a choice among terms so loose 
that they would not be accepted as definitions in any 
really exact science, is, even at that, an uncertain and 
difficult matter on which doctors often differ ; and that the 
very best medical opinion and treatment varies widely 
from doctor to doctor, one practitioner prescribing six 
or seven scheduled poisons for so familiar a disease as 
enteric fever where another will not tolerate drugs at 
all; one starving a patient whom another would stuff; 
one urging an operation which another would regard as 
unnecessary and dangerous; one giving alcohol and meat 
which another would sternly forbid, &c., &c., &c.: all 
these discrepancies arising not between the opinion of 
good doctors and bad ones (the medical contention is, 
of course, that a bad doctor is an impossibility), but 
between practitioners of equal eminence and authority. 
Usually it is impossible to persuade the jury that these 
facts are facts. Juries seldom notice facts; and they 



Preface on Doctors xiii 

have been taught to regard any doubts of the omni- 
science and omnipotence of doctors as blasphemy. Even 
the fact that doctors themselves die of the very diseases 
they profess to cure passes unnoticed. We do not shoot 
out our lips and shake our heads, saying, " They save 
others : themselves they cannot save " : their reputation 
stands, like an African king's palace, on a foundation 
of dead bodies; and the result is that the verdict goes 
against the defendant when the defendant is a doctor 
accused of malpractice. 

Fortunately for the doctors, they very seldom find 
themselves in this position, because it is so difficult to 
prove anything against them. The only evidence that 
can decide a case of malpractice is expert evidence: that 
is, the evidence of other doctors; and every doctor will 
allow a colleague to decimate a whole countryside sooner 
than violate the bond of professional etiquet by giving 
him away. It is the nurse who gives the doctor away 
in private, because every nurse has some particular doc- 
tor whom she likes ; and she usually assures her patients 
that all the others are disastrous noodles, and soothes the 
tedium of the sick-bed by gossip about their blunders. 
She will even give a doctor aAvay for the sake of mak- 
ing the patient believe that she knows more than the 
doctor. But she dare not, for her livelihood, give the 
doctor away in public. And the doctors stand by one 
another at all costs. Now and then some doctor in an 
unassailable position, like the late Sir William Gull, 
will go into the witness box and say what he really 
thinks about the way a patient has been treated; but 
such behavior is considered little short of infamous by 
his colleagues. 



xiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

Why Doctors do not Differ 

The truth is, there would never be any public agree- 
ment among doctors if they did not agree to agree on the 
main point of the doctor being always in the right. Yet 
the two guinea man never thinks that the five shilling 
man is right: if he did, he would be understood as con- 
fessing to an overcharge of £l:17s. ; and on the same 
ground the five shilling man cannot encourage the notion 
that the owner of the sixpenny surgery round the cor- 
ner is quite up to his mark. Thus even the layman 
has to be taught that infallibility is not quite infallible, 
because there are two qualities of it to be had at two 
prices. 

But there is no agreement even in the same rank at 
the same price. During the first great epidemic of in- 
fluenza towards the end of the nineteenth century a 
London evening paper sent round a journalist-patient 
to all the great consultants of that day, and published 
their advice and prescriptions ; a proceeding passionately 
denounced by the medical papers as a breach of con- 
fidence of these eminent physicians. The case was the 
same; but the prescriptions were different, and so was 
the advice. Now a doctor cannot think his own treatment 
right and at the same time think his colleague right in 
prescribing a different treatment when the patient is the 
same. Anyone who has ever known doctors well enough 
to hear medical shop talked without reserve knows that 
they are full of stories about each other's blunders and 
errors, and that the theory of their omniscience and om- 
nipotence no more holds good among themselves than it 
did with Moliere and Napoleon. But for this very rea- 
son no doctor dare accuse another of malpractice. He is 
not sure enough of his own opinion to ruin another man 
by it. He knows that if such conduct were tolerated in 
his profession no doctor's livelihood or reputation would 



Preface on Doctors xv 

be worth a year's purchase. I do not blame him: 1 
should do the same myself. But the eflfect of this state 
of things is to make the medical profession a conspiracy 
to hide its own shortcomings. No doubt the same may 
be said of all professions. They are all conspiracies 
against the laity; and I do not suggest that the medical 
conspiracy is either better or worse than the military 
conspiracy, the legal conspiracy, the sacerdotal con- 
spiracy, the pedagogic conspiracy, the royal and aris- 
tocratic conspiracy, the literary and artistic conspiracyj 
and the innumerable industrial, commercial, and financial 
conspiracies, from the trade unions to the great ex- 
changes, which make up the huge conflict which we call 
society. But it is less suspected. The Radicals who 
used to advocate, as an indispensable preliminary to 
social reform, the strangling of the last king with the 
entrails of the last priest, substituted compulsory vac- 
cination for compulsory baptism without a murmur. 

The Craze for Operations 

Thus everything is on the side of the doctor. "V^Tien 
men die of disease they are said to die from natural 
causes. When they recover (and they mostly do) the 
doctor gets the credit of curing them. In surgery all 
operations are recorded as successful if the patient can 
be got out of the hospital or nursing home alive, though 
the subsequent history of the case may be such as would 
make an honest surgeon vow never to recommend or 
perform the operation again. The large range of opera- 
tions which consist of amputating limbs and extirpating 
organs admits of no direct verification of their necessity. 
There is a fashion in operations as there is in sleeves 
and skirts: the triumph of some surgeon who has at last 
found out how to make a once desperate operation faii'ly 
safe is usually followed by a rage for that operation not 



xvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

only among the doctors, but actually among their pa- 
tients. There are men and women whom the operating 
table seems to fascinate: half-alive people who through 
vanity, or hypochondria, or a craving to be the constant 
objects of anxious attention or what not, lose such feeble 
sense as they ever had of the value of their own organs 
and limbs. They seem to care as little for mutilation 
as lobsters or lizards, which at least have the excuse that 
they grow new claws and new tails if they lose the old 
ones. Whilst this book was being prepared for the press 
a case was tried in the Courts, of a man who sued a 
railway company for damages because a train had run 
over him and amputated both his legs. He lost his 
case because it was proved that he had deliberately con- 
trived the occurrence himself for the sake of getting an 
idler's pension at the expense of the railway company, 
being too dull to realize how much more he had to lose 
than to gain by the bargain even if he had won his case 
and received damages above his utmost hopes. 

This amazing case makes it possible to say, with some 
prospect of being believed, that there is in the classes 
who can afford to pay for fashionable operations a 
sprinkling of persons so incapable of appreciating the 
relative importance of preserving their bodily integrity 
(including the capacity for parentage) and the pleas- 
ure of talking about themselves and hearing themselves 
talked about as the heroes and heroines of sensational 
operations, that they tempt surgeons to operate on them 
not only with huge fees, but with personal solicitation. 
Now it cannot be too often repeated that when an oper- 
ation is once performed, nobody can ever prove that it 
was unnecessary. If I refuse to allow my leg to be 
amputated, its mortification and my death may prove 
that I was wrong; but if I let the leg go, nobody can 
ever prove that it would not have mortified had I been 
obstinate. Operation is therefore the safe side for the 



Preface on Doctors xvii 

surgeon as well as the lucrative side. The result is that 
we hear of " conservative surgeons " as a distinct class 
of practitioners who make it a rule not to operate if they 
can possibly help it, and who are sought after by the 
people who have vitality enough to regard an operation 
as a last resort. But no surgeon is bound to take the 
conservative view. If he believes that an organ is at 
best a useless survival, and that if he extirpates it the 
patient will be well and none the worse in a fortnight, 
whereas to await the natural cure would mean a month's 
illness, then he is clearly justified in recommending the 
operation even if the cure without operation is as certain 
as anything of the kind ever can be. Thus the con- 
servative surgeon and the radical or extirpatory surgeon 
may both be right as far as the ultimate cure is con- 
cerned; so that their consciences do not help them out 
of their differences. 

Credulity and Chloroform 

There is no harder scientific fact in the world than the 
fact that belief can be produced in practically imlimited 
quantity and intensity, without observation or reasoning, 
and even in defiance of both, by the simple desire to be- 
lieve founded on a strong interest in believing. Every- 
body recognizes this in the case of the amatory infatu- 
ations of the adolescents who see angels and heroes in 
obviously (to others) commonplace and even objection- 
able maidens and youths. But it holds good over the 
entire field of human activity. The hardest-headed ma- 
terialist will become a consulter of table-rappers and 
slate-writers if he loses a child or a wife so beloved that 
the desire to revive and communicate with them becomes 
irresistible. The cobbler believes that there is nothing 
like leather. The Imperialist who regards the conquest 
of England by a foreign power as the worst of political 



xviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

misfortunes believes that the conquest of a foreign power 
by England would be a boon to the conquered. Doctors 
are no more proof against such illusions than other men. 
Can anyone then doubt that under existing conditions a 
great deal of unnecessary and mischievous operating is 
bound to go on^ and that patients are encouraged to 
imagine that modern surgery and anesthesia have made 
operations much less serious matters than they really 
are? When doctors write or speak to the public about 
operations, they imply, and often say in so many words, 
that chloroform has made surgery painless. People who 
have been operated on know better. The patient does 
not feel the knife, and the operation is therefore enor- 
mously facilitated for the surgeon; but the patient pays 
for the anesthesia with hours of wretched sickness ; and 
when that is over there is the pain of the wound made 
by the surgeon, which has to heal like any other wound. 
This is why operating surgeons, who are usually out of 
the house with their fee in their pockets before the pa- 
tient has recovered consciousness, and who therefore see 
nothing of the suffering witnessed by the general prac- 
titioner and the nurse, occasionally talk of operations 
very much as the hangman in Barnaby Rudge talked of 
executions, as if being operated on were a luxury in 
sensation as well as in price. 

Medical Poverty 

To make matters worse, doctors are hideously poor. 
The Irish gentleman doctor of my boyhood, who took 
nothing less than a guinea, though he might pay you 
four visits for it, seems to have no equivalent nowadays 
in English society. Better be a railway porter than an 
ordinary English general practitioner. A railway porter 
has from eighteen to twenty-three shillings a week from 
the Company merely as a retainer; and his additional 



Preface on Doctors xix 

fees from the public, if we leave the third-class two- 
penny tip out of account (and I am by no means sure 
that even this reservation need be made), are equivalent 
to doctor's fees in the case of second-class passengers, 
and double doctor's fees in the case of first. Any class 
of educated men thus treated tends to become a brigand 
class, and doctors are no exception to the rule. They 
are offered disgraceful prices for advice and medicine. 
Their patients are for the most part so poor and so 
ignorant that good advice would be resented as imprac- 
ticable and wounding. When you are so poor that you 
cannot afford to refuse eighteenpence from a man who is 
too poor to pay you any more, it is useless to tell him 
that what he or his sick child needs is not medicne, but 
more leisure, better clothes, better food, and a better 
drained and ventilated house. It is kinder to give him 
a bottle of something almost as cheap as water, and tell 
him to come again with another eighteenpence if it does 
not cure him. When you have done that over and over 
again every day for a week, how much scientific con- 
science have you left.'' If you are weak-minded enough 
to cling desperately to your eighteenpence as denoting a 
certain social superiority to the sixpenny doctor, you will 
be miserably poor all your life ; whilst the sixpenny doc- 
tor, with his low prices and quick turnover of patients, 
visibly makes much more than you do and kills no more 
people. 

A doctor's character can no more stand out against 
such conditions than the lungs of his patients can stand 
out against bad ventilation. The only way in which he 
can preserve his self-respect is by forgetting all he ever 
learnt of science, and clinging to such help as he can 
give without cost merely by being less ignorant and more 
accustomed to sick-beds than his patients. Finally, he 
acquires a certain skill at nursing cases under poverty- 
stricken domestic conditions, just as women who have 



XX The Doctor's Dilemma 

been trained as domestic servants in some huge institu- 
tion with lifts, vacuum cleaners, electric lighting, steam 
heating, and machinery that turns the kitchen into a 
laboratory and engine house combined, manage, when 
they are sent out into the world to drudge as general 
servants, to pick up their business in a new way, learn- 
ing the slatternly habits and wretched makeshifts of 
homes where even bundles of kindling wood are luxuries 
to be anxiously economized. 

The Successful Doctor 

The doctor whose success blinds public opinion to 
medical poverty is almost as completely demoralized. 
His promotion means that his practice becomes more and 
more confined to the idle rich. The proper advice for 
most of their ailments is typified in Abernethy's "Live 
on sixpence a day and earn it." But here, as at the 
other end of the scale, the right advice is neither agree- 
able nor practicable. And every hypochondriacal rich 
lady or gentleman who can be persuaded that he or she 
is a lifelong invalid means anything from fifty to five 
hundred pounds a year for the doctor. Operations en- 
able a surgeon to earn similar sums in a couple of hours ; 
and if the surgeon also keeps a nursing home, he may 
make considerable profits at the same time by running 
what is the most expensive kind of hotel. These gains 
are so great that they undo much of the moral advan- 
tage which the absence of grinding pecuniary anxiety 
gives the rich doctor over the poor one. It is true that 
the temptation to prescribe a sham treatment because the 
real treatment is too dear for either patient or doctor 
does not exist for the rich doctor. He always has plenty 
of genuine cases which can afford genuine treatment; 
and these provide him with enough sincere scientific pro- 
fessional work to save him from the ignorance, obso- 



Preface on Doctors xxi 

lescence, and atrophy of scientific conscience into which 
his poorer colleagues sink. But on the other hand his 
expenses are enormous. Even as a bachelor, he must, 
at London west end rates, make over a thousand a year 
before he can afford even to insure his life. His 
house, his servants, and his equipage (or autopage) 
must be on the scale to which his patients are accus- 
tomed, though a couple of rooms with a camp bed in 
one of them might satisfy his own requirements. Above 
all, the income which provides for these outgoings 
stops the moment he himself stops working. Unlike 
the man of business, whose managers, clerks, ware- 
housemen and laborers keep his business going whilst 
he is in bed or in his club, the doctor cannot earn a 
farthing by deputy. Though he is exceptionally exposed 
to infection, and has to face all weathers at all hours 
of the night and day, often not enjoying a complete 
night's rest for a week, the money stops coming in the 
moment he stops going out; and therefore illness has 
special terrors for him, and success no certain perma- 
nence. He dare not stop making hay while the sun 
shines; for it may set at any time. Men do not resist 
pressure of this intensity. When they come under it as 
doctors they pay unnecessary visits; they write pre- 
scriptions that are as absurd as the rub of chalk with 
which an Irish tailor once charmed away a wart from 
my father's finger; they conspire with surgeons to pro- 
mote operations ; they nurse the delusions of the malade 
imaginaire (who is always really ill because, as there is 
no such thing as perfect health, nobody is ever really 
well) ; they exploit human folly, vanity, and fear of 
death as ruthlessly as their own health, strength, and 
patience are exploited by selfish hypochondriacs. They 
must do all these things or else run pecuniary risks that 
no man can fairly be asked to run. And the healthier 
the world becomes, the more they are compelled to live 



xxii The Doctor's Dilemma 

by imposture and the less by that really helpful activity 
of which all doctors get enough to preserve them from 
utter corruption. For even the most hardened humbug 
who ever prescribed ether tonics to ladies whose need 
for tonics is of precisely the same character as the need 
of poorer women for a glass of gin, has to help a mother 
through child-bearing often enough to feel that he is not 
living wholly in vain. 

The Psychology of Self-Respect in 
Surgeons 

The surgeon, though often more unscrupulous than the 
general practitioner, retains his self-respect more easily. 
The human conscience can subsist on very questionable 
food. No man who is occupied in doing a very difficult 
thing, and doing it very well, ever loses his self-respect. 
The shirk, the duffer, the malingerer, the coward, the 
weakling, may be put out of countenance by his own 
failures and frauds ; but the man who does evil skilfully, 
energetically, masterfully, grows prouder and bolder at 
every crime. The common man may have to found his 
self-respect on sobriety, honesty and industry; but a 
Napoleon needs no such props for his sense of dignity. 
If Nelson's conscience whispered to him at all in the 
silent watches of the night, you may depend on it it 
whispered about the Baltic and the Nile and Cape St. 
Vincent, and not about his unfaithfulness to his wife. 
A man who robs little children when no one is looking 
can hardly have much self-respect or even self-esteem; 
but an accomplished burglar must be proud of himself. 
In the play to which I am at present preluding I have 
represented an artist who is so entirely satisfied with 
his artistic conscience, even to the point of dying like a 
saint with its support, that he is utterly selfish and un- 
scrupulous in every other relation without feeling at the 



Preface on Doctors xxiii 

smallest disadvantage. The same thing may be observed 
in women who have a genius for personal attractiveness : 
they expend more thought, labor, skill, inventiveness, 
taste and endurance on making themselves lovely than 
would suffice to keep a dozen ugly women honest; and 
this enables them to maintain a high opinion of them- 
selves, and an angry contempt for unattractive and per- 
sonally careless women, whilst they lie and cheat and 
slander and sell themselves without a blush. The truth 
is, hardly any of us have ethica °nergy enough for more 
than one really inflexible poini, of honor. Andrea del 
Sarto, like Louis Dubed '-^ my play, must have ex- 
pended on the attainment ^- his great mastery of design 
and his originality in fresco painting more conscien- 
tiousness and industry than go to the making of the 
reputations of a dozen ordinary mayors and church- 
wardens; but (if Vasari is to be believed) when the 
King of France entrusted him with money to buy pic- 
tures for him, he stole it to spend on his wife. Such 
cases are not confined to eminent artists. Unsuccessful, 
unskilful men are often much more scrupulous than suc- 
cessful ones. In the ranks of ordinary skilled labor 
many men are to be found who earn good wages and 
are never out of a job because they are strong, inde- 
fatigable, and skilful, and who therefore are bold in a 
high opinion of themselves ; but they are selfish and 
tyrannical, gluttonous and drunken, as their wives and 
children know to their cost. 

Not only do these talented energetic people retain 
their self-respect through shameful misconduct: they do 
not even lose the respect of others, because their talents 
benefit and interest everybody, whilst their vices affect 
only a few. An actor, a painter, a composer, an author, 
may be as selfish as he likes without reproach from the 
public if only his art is superb; and he cannot fulfil 
this condition without sufficient effort and sacrifice to 



xxiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

make him feel noble and martyred in spite of his selfish- 
ness. It may even happen that the selfishness of an 
artist may be a benefit to the public by enabling him 
to concentrate himself on their gratification with a reck- 
lessness of every other consideration that makes him 
highly dangerous to those about him. In sacrificing 
others to himself he is sacrificing them to the public 
he gratifies; and the public is quite content with that 
arrangement. The public actually has an interest in the 
artist's vices. 

It has no such interest in the surgeon's vices. The 
surgeon's art is exercised at its expense, not for its 
gratification. We do not go to the operating table as we 
go to the theatre, to the picture gallery, to the concert 
room, to be entertained and delighted: we go to be tor- 
mented and maimed, lest a worse thing should befall us. 
It is of the most extreme importance to us that the ex- 
perts on whose assurance we face this horror and suffer 
this mutilation should have no interests but our own to 
think of; should judge our cases scientifically; and 
should feel about them kindly. Let us see what guaran- 
tees we have: first for the science, and then for the 
kindness. 

Are Doctors Men of Science? 

I presume nobody will question the existence of a 
widely spread popular delusion that every doctor is a 
man of science. It is escaped only in the very small 
class which understands by science something more than 
conjuring with retorts and spirit lamps, magnets and 
microscopes, and discovering magical cures for disease. 
To a sufficiently ignorant man every captain of a trad- 
ing schooner is a Galileo, every organ-grinder a Bee- 
thoven, every piano-tuner a Helmholtz, every Old Bailey 
barrister a Solon, every Seven Dials pigeon dealer a 



Preface on Doctors xxv 

Darwin, every scrivener a Shakespear, every locomotive 
engine a miracle, and its driver no less wonderful than 
George Stephenson. As a matter of fact, the rank 
and file of doctors are no more scientific than their 
tailors; or, if you prefer to put it the reverse way, their 
tailors are no less scientific than they. Doctoring is an 
art, not a science: any layman who is interested in 
science sufficiently to take in one of the scientific jour- 
nals and follow the literature of the scientific movement, 
knows more about it than those doctors (probably a large 
majority) who are not interested in it, and practise only 
to earn their bread. Doctoring is not even the art of 
keeping people in health (no doctor seems able to advise 
you what to eat any better than his grandmother or the 
nearest quack) : it is the art of curing illnesses. It does 
happen exceptionally that a practising doctor makes a 
contribution to science (my play describes a very notable 
one) ; but it happens much oftener that he draws disas- 
trous conclusions from his clinical experience because he 
has no conception of scientific method, and believes, 
like any rustic, that the handling of evidence and statis- 
tics needs no expertness. The distinction between a 
quack doctor and a qualified one is mainly that only the 
qualified one is authorized to sign death certificates, for 
which both sorts seem to have about equal occasion. 
Unqualified practitioners now make large incomes as 
hygienists, and are resorted to as frequently by culti- 
vated amateur scientists who understand quite well what 
they are doing as by ignorant people who are simply 
dupes. Bone-setters make fortunes under the very noses 
of our greatest surgeons from educated and wealthy pa- 
tients; and some of the most successful doctors on the 
register use quite heretical methods of treating disease, 
and have qualified themselves solely for convenience. 
Leaving out of account the village witches who prescribe 
spells and sell charms, the humblest professional healers 



xxvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

in this country are the herbalists. These men wander 
through the fields on Sunday seeking for herbs with 
magic properties of curing disease, preventing child- 
birth, and the like. Each of them believes that he is on 
the verge of a great discovery, in which Virginia Snake 
Root will be an ingredient, heaven knows why ! Vir- 
ginia Snake Root fascinates the imagination of the herba- 
list as mercury used to fascinate the alchemists. On 
week days he keeps a shop in which he sells packets of 
pennyroyal, dandelion, &c., labelled with little lists of 
the diseases they are supposed to cure, and apparently 
do cure to the satisfaction of the people who keep on 
buying them. I have never been able to perceive any 
distinction between the science of the herbalist and that 
of the duly registered doctor. A relative of mine re- 
cently consulted a doctor about some of the ordinary 
symptoms which indicate the need for a holiday and a 
change. The doctor satisfied himself that the patient's 
heart was a little depressed. Digitalis being a drug la- 
belled as a heart specific by the profession, he promptly 
administered a stiff dose. Fortunately the patient was 
a hardy old lady who was not easily killed. She recov- 
ered with no worse result than her conversion to Chris- 
tian Science, which owes its vogue quite as much to 
public despair of doctors as to superstition. I am not, 
observe, here concerned with the question as to whether 
the dose of digitalis was judicious or not; the point is, 
that a farm laborer consulting a herbalist would have 
been treated in exactly the same way. 

Bacteriology as a Superstition 

The smattering of science that all — even doctors — 
pick up from the ordinary newspapers nowadays only 
makes the doctor more dangerous than he used to be. 
Wise men used to take care to consult doctors qualified 



Preface on Doctors xxvii 

before I860, who were usually contemptuous of or indif- 
ferent to the germ theory and bacteriological therapeu- 
tics ; but now that these veterans have mostly retired or 
died, we are left in the hands of the generations which, 
having heard of microbes much as St. Thomas Aquinas 
heard of angels, suddenly concluded that the whole art 
of healing could be summed up in the formula : Find the 
microbe and kill it. And even that they did not know 
how to do. The simplest way to kill most microbes is 
to throw them into an open street or river and let the 
sun shine on them, which explains the fact that when 
great cities have recklessly thrown all their sewage into 
the open river the water has sometimes been cleaner 
twenty miles below the city than thirty miles above it. 
But doctors instinctively avoid all facts that are reas- 
suring, and eagerly swallow those that make it a marvel 
that anyone could possibly survive three days in an 
atmosphere consisting mainly of countless pathogenic 
germs. They conceive microbes as immortal until slain 
by a germicide administered by a duly qualified medical 
man. All through Europe people are adjured, by public 
notices and even under legal penalties, not to throw their 
microbes into the sunshine, but to collect them carefully 
in a handkerchief; shield the handkerchief from the sim 
in the darkness and warmth of the pocket; and send it 
to a laundry to be mixed up with everybody eles's hand- 
kerchiefs, with results only too familiar to local health 
authorities. 

In the first frenzy of microbe killing, surgical instru- 
ments were dipped in carbolic oil, which was a great 
improvement on not dipping them in anything at all and 
simply using them dirty; but as microbes are so fond 
of carbolic oil that they swarm in it, it was not a suc- 
cess from the anti-microbe point of view. Formalin was 
squirted into the circulation of consumptives until it was 
discovered that formalin nourishes the tubercle bacillus 



xxviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

handsomely and kills men. The popular theory of 
disease is the common medical theory: namely, that every 
disease had its microbe duly created in the garden of 
Eden, and has been steadily propagating itself and pro- 
ducing widening circles of malignant disease ever since. 
It was plain from the first that if this had been even 
approximately true, the whole human race would have 
been wiped out by the plague long ago, and that every 
epidemic, instead of fading out as mysteriously as it 
rushed in, would spread over the whole world. It was 
also evident that the characteristic microbe of a disease 
might be a symptom instead of a cause. An unpunctual 
man is always in a hurry; but it does not follow that 
hurry is the cause of unpunctuality : on the contrary, 
what is the matter with the patient is sloth. When Flor- 
ence Nightingale said bluntly that if you overcrowded 
your soldiers in dirty quarters there would be an out- 
break of smallpox among them, she was snubbed as an 
ignorant female who did not know that smallpox can be 
produced only by the importation of its specific microbe. 
If this was the line taken about smallpox, the microbe 
of which has never yet been run down and exposed under 
the microscope by the bacteriologist, what must have 
been the ardor of conviction as to tuberculosis, tetanus, 
enteric fever, Maltese fever, diphtheria, and the rest of 
the diseases in which the characteristic bacillus had been 
identified! When there was no bacillus it was assumed 
that, since no disease could exist without a bacillus, it 
was simply eluding observation. When the bacillus was 
found, as it frequently was, in persons who were not 
suffering from the disease, the theory was saved by 
simply calling the bacillus an impostor, or pseudo- 
bacillus. The same boundless credulity which the public 
exhibit as to a doctor's power of diagnosis was shown by 
the doctors themselves as to the analytic microbe hunt- 
ers. These witch finders would give you a certificate of 



Preface on Doctors xxix 

the ultimate constitution of anything from a sample of 
the water from your well to a scrap of your lungs, for 
seven-and-sixpense. I do not suggest that the analysts 
were dishonest. No doubt they carried the analysis as 
far as they could afford to carry it for the money. No 
doubt also they could afford to carry it far enough to be 
of some use. But the fact remains that just as doctors 
perform for half-a-crown, without the least misgiving, 
operations which could not be thoroughly and safely 
performed with due scientific rigor and the requisite ap- 
paratus by an unaided private practitioner for less than 
some thousands of pounds, so did they proceed on the 
assumption that they could get the last word of science 
as to the constituents of their pathological samples for a 
two hours cab fare. 

Economic Difficulties of Immunization 

I have heard doctors affirm and deny almost every 
possible proposition as to disease and treatment. I can 
remember the time when doctors no more dreamt of con- 
sumption and pneumonia being infectious than they now 
dream of sea-sickness being infectious, or than so great a 
clinical observer as Sydenham dreamt of smallpox being 
infectious. I have heard doctors deny that there is such 
a thing as infection. I have heard them deny the ex- 
istence of hydrophobia as a specific disease differing 
from tetanus. I have heard them defend prophylactic 
measures and prophylactic legislation as the sole and 
certain salvation of mankind from zymotic disease; and 
I have heard them denounce both as malignant spreaders 
of cancer and lunacy. But the one objection I have 
never heard from a doctor is the objection that prophy- 
laxis by the inoculatory methods most in vogue is an eco- 
nomic impossibility under our private practice system. 
They buy some stuff from somebody for a shilling, and 



XXX The Doctor's Dilemma 

inject a pennyworth of it under their patient's skin for 
half-a-crown^ concluding that, since this primitive rite 
pays the somebody and pays them, the problem of 
prophylaxis has been satisfactorily solved. The results 
are sometimes no worse than the ordinary results of dirt 
getting into cuts ; but neither the doctor nor the patient 
is quite satisfied unless the inoculation "takes "; that is, 
unless it produces perceptible ilhiess and disablement. 
Sometimes both doctor and patient get more value in this 
direction than they bargain for. The results of ordi- 
nary private-practice-inoculation ct their worst are bad 
enough to be indistinguishable from those of the most 
discreditable and dreaded disease known ; and doctors, 
to save the credit of the inoculation, have been driven 
to accuse their patient or their patient's parents of hav- 
ing contracted this disease independently of the inocula- 
tion, an excuse which naturally does not make the family 
any more resigned, and leads to public recriminations in 
which the doctors, forgetting everything but the imme- 
diate quarrel, naively excuse themselves by admitting, 
and even claiming as a point in their favor, that it is 
often impossible to distinguish the disease produced by 
their inoculation and the disease they have accused the 
patient of contracting. And both parties assume that 
what is at issue is the scientific soundness of the 
prophylaxis. It never occurs to them that the particular 
pathogenic germ which they intended to introduce into 
the patient's system may be quite innocent of the catas- 
trophe, and that the casual dirt introduced with it may 
be at fault. When, as in the case of smallpox or cow- 
pox, the germ has not yet been detected, what you in- 
oculate is simply undefined matter that has been scraped 
off an anything but chemically clean calf suffering from 
the disease in question. You take your chance of the 
germ being in the scrapings, and, lest you should kill 
it, you take no precautions against other germs being in 



Preface on Doctors xxxi 

it as well. Anything may happen as the result of such 
an inoculation. Yet this is the only stuff of the kind 
which is prepared and supplied even in State establish- 
ments: that is, in the only establishments free from the 
commercial temptation to adulterate materials and scamp 
precautionary processes. 

Even if the germ were identified, complete precautions 
would hardly pay. It is true that microbe farming is 
not expensive. The cost of breeding and housing two 
head of cattle would provide for the breeding and hous- 
ing of enough microbes to inoculate the entire population 
of the globe since human life first appeared on it. But 
the precautions necessary to insure that the inoculation 
shall consist of nothing else but the required germ in the 
proper state of attenuation are a very different matter 
from the precautions necessary in the distribution and 
consumption of beefsteaks. Yet people expect to find 
vaccines and antitoxins and the like retailed at " popular 
prices " in private enterprise shops just as they expect 
to find ounces of tobacco and papers of pins. 

The Perils of Inoculation 

The trouble does not end with the matter to be in- 
oculated. There is the question of the condition of the 
patient. The discoveries of Sir Almroth Wright have 
shewn that the appalling results which led to the hasty 
dropping in 189^ of Koch's tuberculin were not acci- 
dents, but perfectly orderly and inevitable phenomena 
following the injection of dangerously strong " vac- 
cines " at the wrong moment, and reinforcing the disease 
instead of stimulating the resistance to it. To ascertain 
the right moment a laboratory and a staff of experts are 
needed. The general practitioner, having no such lab- 
oratory and no such experience, has always chanced it, 
and insisted, when he was unlucky, that the results were 



xxxii The Doctor's Dilemma 

not due to the inoculation, but to some other cause: a 
favorite and not very tactful one being the drunkenness 
or licentiousness of the patient. But though a few doc- 
tors have now learnt the danger of inoculating without 
any reference to the patient's " opsonic index " at the 
moment of inoculation, and though those other doctors 
who are denouncing the danger as imaginary and op- 
sonin as a craze or a fad, obviously do so because it 
involves an operation which they have neither the means 
nor the knowledge to perform, there is still no grasp of 
the economic change in the situation. They have never 
been warned that the practicability of any method of ex- 
tirpating disease depends not only on its efficacy, but on 
its cost. For example, just at present the world has run 
raving mad on the subject of radium, which has excited 
our credulity precisely as the apparitions at Lourdes ex- 
cited the credulity of Roman Catholics. Suppose it were 
ascertained that every child in the world could be ren- 
dered absolutely immune from all disease during its 
entire life by taking half an ounce of radium to every 
pint of its milk. The world would be none the healthier, 
because not even a Crown Prince — no, not even the son 
of a Chicago Meat King, could afford the treatment. 
Yet it is doubtful whether doctors would refrain from 
prescribing it on that ground. The recklessness with 
which they now recommend wintering in Egypt or at 
Davos to people who cannot afford to go to Cornwall, 
and the orders given for champagne jelly and old port 
in households where such luxuries must obviously be 
acquired at the cost of stinting necessaries, often make 
one wonder whether it is possible for a man to go 
through a medical training and retain a spark of common 
sense. 

This sort of inconsiderateness gets cured only in the 
classes where poverty, pretentious as it is even at its 
worst, cannot pitch its pretences high enough to make it 



Preface on Doctors xxxiii 

possible for the doctor (himself often no better off than 
the patient) to assume that the average income of an 
English famfjy is about £2^000 a year, and that it is 
quite easy to break up a home, sell an old family seat 
at a sacrifice, and retire into a foreign sanatorium de- 
voted to some " treatment " that did not exist two years 
ago and probably will not exist (except as a pretext for 
keeping an ordinary hotel) two years hence. In a poor 
practice the doctor must find cheap treatments for cheap 
people, or humiliate and lose his patients either by pre- 
scribing beyond their means or sending them to the 
public hospitals. When it comes to prophylactic in- 
oculation, the alternative lies between the complete scien- 
tific process, which can only be brought down to a 
reasonable cost by being very highly organized as a 
public service in a public institution, and such cheap, 
nasty, dangerous and scientifically spurious imitations as 
ordinary vaccination, which seems not unlikely to be 
ended, like its equally vaunted forerunner, XVIII, cen- 
tury inoculation, by a purely reactionary law making all 
sorts of vaccination, scientific or not, criminal offences. 
Naturally, the poor doctor (that is, the average doctor) 
defends ordinary vaccination frantically, as it means to 
him the bread of his children. To secure the vehement 
and practically unanimous support of the rank and file 
of the medical profession for any sort of treatment or 
operation, all that is necessary is that it can be easily 
practised by a rather shabbily dressed man in a surgi- 
cally^ dirty room in a surgically dirty house vpithout any 
assistance, and that the materials for it shall cost, say, 
a penny, and the charge for it to a patient with <£lOO 
a year be half-a-crown. And, on the other hand, a 
hygienic measure has only to be one of such refinement, 
difficulty, precision and costliness as to be quite beyond 
the resources of private practice, to be ignored or angrily 
denounced as a fad. 



xxxiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

Trade Unionism and Science 

Here we have the explanation of the savage rancor 
that so amazes people who imagine that the controversy 
concerning vaccination is a scientific one. It has really 
nothing to do with science. The medical profession, con- 
sisting for the most part of very poor men struggling 
to keep up appearances beyond their means, find them- 
selves threatened with the extinction of a considerable 
part of their incomes : a part, too, that is easily and 
regularly earned, since it is independent of disease, and 
brings every person born into the nation, healthy or not, 
to the doctors. To boot, there is the occasional windfall 
of an epidemic, with its panic and rush for revaccina- 
tion. Under such circumstances, vaccination would be 
defended desperately were it twice as dirty, dangerous, 
and imscientific in method as it actually is. The note 
of fury in the defence, the feeling that the anti-vaccina- 
tor is doing a cruel, ruinous, inconsiderate thing in a 
mood of malignant folly: all this, so puzzling to the 
observer who knows nothing of the economic side of the 
question, and only sees that the anti-vaccinator, having 
nothing whatever to gain and a good deal to lose by 
placing himself in opposition to the law and to the out- 
cry that adds private persecution to legal penalties, can 
have no interest in the matter except the interest of a 
reformer in abolishing a corrupt and mischievous super- 
stition, becomes intelligible the moment the tragedy of 
medical poverty and the lucrativeness of cheap vaccina- 
tion is taken into account. 

In the face of such economic pressure as this, it is 
silly to expect that medical teaching, any more than 
medical practice, can possibly be scientific. The test to 
which all methods of treatment are finally brought is 
whether they are lucrative to doctors or not. It would be 
difficult to cite any proposition less obnoxious to science 



Preface on Doctors xxxv 

than that advanced by Hahnemann: to wit, that drugs 
which in large doses produce certain symptoms, counter- 
act them in very small doses, just as in more modern 
practice it is found that a sufficiently small inoculation 
with typhoid rallies our powers to resist the disease in- 
stead of prostrating us with it. But Hahnemann and 
his followers were frantically persecuted for a century 
by generations of apothecary-doctors whose incomes de- 
pended on the quantity of drugs they could induce their 
patients to swallow. These two cases of ordinary vac- 
cination and homeopathy are typical of all the rest. Just 
as the object of a trade union under existing conditions 
must finally be, not to improve the technical quality of 
the work done by its members, but to secure a living 
wage for them, so the object of the medical profession 
today is to secure an income for the private doctor; and 
to this consideration all concern for science and public 
health must give way when the two come into conflict. 
Fortunately they are not always in conflict. Up to a 
certain point doctors, like carpenters and masons, must 
earn their living by doing the work that the public wants 
from them; and as it is not in the nature of things pos- 
sible that such public want should be based on unmixed 
disutility, it may be admitted that doctors have their uses, 
real as well as imaginary. But just as the best car- 
penter or mason will resist the introduction of a machine 
that is likely to throw him out of work, or the public 
technical education of unskilled laborers' sons to com- 
pete with him, so the doctor will resist with all his 
powers of persecution every advance of science that 
threatens his income. And as the advance of scientific 
hygiene tends to make the private doctor's visits rarer, 
and the public inspector's frequenter, whilst the advance 
of scientific therapeutics is in the direction of treatments 
that involve highly organized laboratories, hospitals, and 
public institutions generally, it unluckily happens that 



xxxvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

the organization of private practitioners which we call 
the medical profession is coming more and more to rep- 
resent, not science, but desperate and embittered anti- 
science: a statement of things which is likely to get 
worse until the average doctor either depends upon or 
hopes for an appointment in the public health service 
for his livelihood. 

So much for our guarantees as to medical science. 
Let us now deal with the more painful subject of medical 
kindness. 

Doctors and Vivisection 

The importance to our doctors of a reputation for the 
tenderest humanity is so obvious, and the quantity of 
benevolent work actually done by them for nothing (a 
great deal of it from sheer good nature) so large, that at 
first sight it seems imaccountable that they should not 
only throw all their credit away, but deliberately choose 
to band themselves publicly with outlaws and scoundrels 
by claiming that in the pursuit of their professional 
knowledge they should be free from the restraints of law, 
of honor, of pity, of remorse, of everything that distin- 
guishes an orderly citizen from a South Sea buccaneer, 
or a philosopher from an inquisitor. For here we look in 
vain for either an economic or a sentimental motive. In 
every generation fools and blackguards have made this 
claim ; and honest and reasonable men, led by the strong- 
est contemporary minds, have repudiated it and exposed 
its crude rascality. From Shakespear and Dr. Johnson 
to Ruskin and Mark Twain, the natural abhorrence of 
sane mankind for the vivisector's cruelty, and the con- 
tempt of able thinkers for his imbecile casuistry, have 
been expressed by the most popular spokesmen of hu- 
manity. If the medical profession were to outdo the 
Anti- Vivisection Societies in a general professional pro- 



Preface on Doctors xxxvii 

test against the practice and principles of the vivisectors, 
every doctor in the kingdom would gain substantially by 
the immense relief and reconciliation which would follow 
such a reassurance of the humanity of the doctor. Not 
one doctor in a thousand is a vivisector, or has any in- 
terest in vivisection, either pecuniary or intellectual, or 
would treat his dog cruelly or allow anyone else to do it. 
It is true that the doctor complies with the professional 
fashion of defending vivisection, and assuring you that 
people like Shakespear and Dr. Johnson and Ruskin and 
Mark Twain are ignorant sentimentalists, just as he com- 
plies with any other silly fashion: the mystery is, how 
it became the fashion in spite of its being so injurious to 
those who follow it. Making all possible allowance for 
the effect of the brazen lying of the few men who bring a 
rush of despairing patients to their doors by professing 
in letters to the newspapers to have learnt from vivisec- 
tion how to cure certain diseases, and the assurances of 
the sayers of smooth things that the practice is quite 
painless under the law, it is still difficult to find any civil- 
ized motive for an attitude by which the medical profes- 
sion has everything to lose and nothing to gain. 

The Primitive Savage Motive 

I say civilized motive advisedly; for primitive tribal 
motives are easy enough to find. Every savage chief who 
is not a Mahomet learns that if he wishes to strike the 
imagination of his tribe — and without doing that he can- 
not rule them — he must terrify or revolt them from time 
to time by acts of hideous cruelty or disgusting unnatu- 
ralness. We are far from being as superior to such tribes 
as we imagine. It is very doubtful indeed whether Peter 
the Great could have effected the changes he made in 
Russia if he had not fascinated and intimidated his peo- 
ple by his monstrous cruelties and grotesque escapades. 



xxxviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

Had he been a nineteenth-century king of England, he 
would have had to wait for some huge accidental calam- 
ity: a cholera epidemic, a war, or an insurrection, before 
waking us up sufficiently to get anything done. Vivisec- 
tion helps the doctor to rule us as Peter ruled the Rus- 
sians. The notion that the man who does dreadful things 
is superhuman, and that therefore he can also do wonder- 
ful things either as ruler, avenger, healer, or what not, 
is by no means confined to barbarians. Just as the mani- 
fold wickednesses and stupidities of our criminal code 
are supported, not by any general comprehension of law 
or study of jurisprudence, not even by simple vindictive- 
ness, but by the superstition that a calamity of any sort 
must be expiated by a human sacrifice; so the wicked- 
nesses and stupidities of our medicine men are rooted in 
superstitions that have no more to do with science than 
the traditional ceremony of christening an ironclad has 
to do with the effectiveness of its armament. We have 
only to turn to Macaulay's description of the treatment 
of Charles II. in his last illness to see how strongly his 
physicians felt that their only chance of cheating death 
was by outraging nature in tormenting and disgusting 
their unfortunate patient. True, this was more than two 
centuries ago; but I have heard my own nineteenth-cen- 
tury grandfather describe the cupping and firing and 
nauseous medicines of his time with perfect credulity as 
to their beneficial effects; and some more modern treat- 
ments appear to me quite as barbarous. It is in this way 
that vivisection pays the doctor. It appeals to the fear 
and credulity of the savage in us; and without fear and 
credulity half the private doctor's occupation and seven- 
eighths of his influence would be gone. 



Preface on Doctors xxxix 

The Higher ]\Iotive. The Tree of 
Knowledge 

But the greatest force of all on the side of vivisection 
is the mighty and indeed divine force of curiosity. Here 
we have no decaying tribal instinct which men strive to 
root out of themselves as they strive to root out the 
tiger's lust for blood. On the contrary, the curiosity of 
the ape, or of the child who pulls out the legs and wings 
of a fly to see what it will do without them, or who, on 
being told that a cat dropped out of the window will 
always fall on its legs, immediately tries the experiment 
on the nearest cat from the highest window in the house 
(I protest I did it myself from the first floor only), is as 
nothing compared to the thirst for knowledge of the phi- 
losopher, the poet, the biologist, and the naturalist. I 
have always despised Adam because he had to be tempted 
by the woman, as she was by the serpent, before he could 
be induced to pluck the apple from the tree of knowl- 
edge. I should have swallowed every apjDle on the tree 
the moment the owner's back was turned. When Gray 
said " Where ignorance is bliss, 'tis folly to be wise," he 
forgot that it is godlike to be wise; and since nobody 
wants bliss particularly, or could stand more than a very 
brief taste of it if it were attainable, and since everybody, 
by the deepest law of the Life Force, desires to be god- 
like, it is stupid, and indeed blasphemous and despairing, 
to hope that the thirst for knowledge will either diminish 
or consent to be subordinated to any other end whatso- 
ever. We shall see later on that the claim that has arisen 
in this way for the unconditioned pursuit of knowledge 
is as idle as all dreams of unconditioned activity; but 
none the less the right to knowledge must be regarded 
as a fundamental human right. The fact that men of 
science have had to fight so hard to secure its recogni- 



xl The Doctor's Dilemma 

tion, and are still so vigorously persecuted when they dis- 
cover anything that is not quite palatable to vulgar peo- 
ple, makes them sorely jealous for that right; and when 
they hear a popular outcry for the suppression of a 
method of research which has an air of being scientific, 
their first instinct is to rally to the defence of that 
method without further consideration, with the result that 
they sometimes, as in the case of vivisection, presently 
find themselves fighting on a false issue. 

The Flaw in the Argument 

I may as well pause here to explain their error. The 
right to know is like the right to live. It is fundamental 
and unconditional in its assumption that knowledge, like 
life, is a desirable thing, though any fool can prove that 
ignorance is bliss, and that " a little knowledge is a dan- 
gerous thing " (a little being the most that any of us can 
attain), as easily as that the pains of life are more ftu- 
merous and constant than its pleasures, and that there- 
fore we should all be better dead. The logic is unim- 
peachable; but its only effect is to make us say that if 
these are the conclusions logic leads to, so much the worse 
for logic, after which curt dismissal of Folly, we continue 
living and learning by instinct: that is, as of right. We 
legislate on the assumption that no man may be killed on 
the strength of a demonstration that he would be hap- 
pier in his grave, not even if he is dying slowly of cancer 
and begs the doctor to despatch him quickly and merci- 
fully. To get killed lawfully he must violate somebody 
else's right to live by committing murder. But he is by 
no means free to live unconditionally. In society he can 
exercise his right to live only under very stiff conditions. 
In countries where there is compulsory military service 
he may even have to throw away his individual life to 
save the life of the community. 



Preface on Doctors xli 

It is just so in the case of the right to knowledge. It 
is a right that is as yet very imperfectly recognized in 
practice. But in theory it is admitted that an adult 
person in pursuit of knowledge must not be refused 
it on the ground that he would be better or happier with- 
out it. Parents and priests may forbid knowledge to 
those who accept their authority; and social taboo may 
be made effective by acts of legal persecution under cover 
of repressing blasphemy, obscenity, and sedition ; but no 
government now openly forbids its subjects to pursue 
knowledge on the ground that knowledge is in itself a bad 
thing, or that it is possible for any of us to have too 
much of it. 



Limitations of the Right to Knowledge 

But neither does any government exempt the pursuit 
of knowledge, any more than the pursuit of life, liberty, 
and happiness (as the American Constitution puts it), 
from all social conditions. No man is allowed to put 
his mother into the stove because he desires to know how 
long an adult woman will survive at a temperature of 
500° Fahrenheit, no matter how important or interesting 
that particular addition to the store of human knowledge 
may be. A man who did so would have short work made 
not only of his right to knowledge, but of his right to 
live and all his other rights at the same time. The right 
to knowledge is not the only right; and its exercise must 
be limited by respect for other rights, and for its own 
exercise by others. When a man says to Society, " May 
I torture my mother in pursuit of knowledge ? " Society 
replies, "No." If he pleads, "What! Not even if I 
have a chance of finding out how to cure cancer by doing 
it? " Society still says, " Not even then." If the scien- 
tist, making the best of his disappointment, goes on to 
ask may he torture a dog, the stupid and callous people 



xlii The Doctor's Dilemma 

who do not realize that a dog is a fellow-creature and 
sometimes a good friend, ma.y say Yes, though Shake- 
spear, Dr. Johnson and their like may say No. But even 
those who say " You may torture a dog " never say 
" You may torture my dog." And nobody says, " Yes, 
because in the pursuit of knowledge you may do as you 
please." Just as even the stupidest people say, in effect, 
" If you cannot attain to knowledge without burning 
your mother you must do without knowledge," so the 
wisest people say, "If you cannot attain to knowledge 
without torturing a dog, you must do without knowl- 
edge." 

A False Alternative 

But in practice you cannot persuade any wise man that 
this alternative can ever be forced on anyone but a fool, 
or that a fool can be trusted to learn anything from any 
experiment, cruel or humane. The Chinaman who burnt 
down his house to roast his pig was no doubt honestly 
unable to conceive any less disastrous way of cooking his 
dinner; and the roast must have been spoiled after all (a 
perfect type of the average vivisectionist experiment) ; 
but this did not prove that the Chinaman was right: it 
only proved that the Chinaman was an incapable cook 
and, fundamentally, a fool. 

Take another celebrated experiment: one in sanitary 
reform. In the days of Nero Rome was in the same pre- 
dicament as London to-day. If some one would burn 
down London, and it were rebuilt, as it would now have 
to be, subject to the sanitary by-laws and Building Act 
provisions enforced by the London County Council, it 
would be enormously improved ; and the average lifetime 
of Londoners would be considerably prolonged. Nero 
argued in the same way about Rome. He employed in- 
cendiaries to set it on fire; and he played the harp in 



Preface on Doctors xliii 

scientific raptures whilst it was burning. I am so far of 
Nero's way of thinking that I have often said, when con- 
sulted by despairing sanitary reformers, that what Lon- 
don needs to make her healthy is an earthquake. Why, 
then, it may be asked, do not I, as a public-spirited man, 
employ incendiaries to set it on fire, with a heroic disre- 
gard of the consequences to myself and others? Any 
vivisector would, if he had the courage of his opinions. 
The reasonable answer is that London can be made 
healthy without burning her down; and that as we have 
not enough civic virtue to make her healthy in a humane 
and economical way, we should not have enough to re- 
build her in that way. In the old Hebrew legend, God 
lost patience with the world as Nero did with Rome, and 
drowned everybody except a single family. But the re- 
sult was that the progeny of that family reproduced all 
tlie vices of their predecessors so exactly that the misery 
caused by the flood might just as well have been spared: 
things went on just as they did before. In the same 
way, the lists of diseases which vivisection claims to have 
cured is long; but the returns of the Registrar-General 
shew that people still persist in dying of them as if vivi- 
section had never been heard of. Any fool can burn 
down a ciy or cut an animal open; and an exceptionally 
foolish fool is quite likely to promise enormous benefits 
to the race as the result of such activities. But when the 
constructive, benevolent part of the business comes to be 
done, the same want of imagination, the same stupidity 
and cruelty, the same laziness and want of perseverance 
that prevented Nero or the vivisector from devising or 
pushing through humane methods, prevents him from 
bringing order out of the chaos and happiness out of the 
misery he has made. At one time it seemed reasonable 
enough to declare that it was impossible to find whether 
or not there was a stone inside a man's body except by 
exploring it with a knife, or to find out what the sun is 



xliv The Doctor's Dilemma 

made of without visiting it in a balloon. Both these im- 
possibilities have been achieved, but not by vivisectors. 
The Rontgen rays need not hurt the patient; and spec- 
trum analysis involves no destruction. After such tri- 
umphs of humane experiment and reasoning, it is useless 
to assure us that there is no other key to knowledge ex- 
cept cruelty. When the vivisector offers us that assur- 
ance, we reply simply and contemptuously, " You mean 
that you are not clever or humane or energetic enough 
to find one." 

Cruelty for its own Sake 

It will now, I hope, be clear why the attack on vivi- 
section is not an attack on the right to knowledge: why, 
indeed, those who have the deepest conviction of the 
sacredness of that right are the leaders of the attack. No 
knowledge is finally impossible of human attainment; for 
even though it may be beyond our present capacity, the 
needed capacity is not unattainable. Consequently no 
method of investigation is the only method; and no law 
forbidding any particular method can cut us off from the 
knowledge we hope to gain by it. The only knowledge 
we lose by forbidding cruelty is knowledge at first hand 
of cruelty itself, which is precisely the knowledge hu- 
mane people wish to be spared. 

But the question remains : Do we all really wish to be 
spared that knowledge? Are humane methods really to 
be preferred to cruel ones? Even if the experiments 
come to nothing, may not their cruelty be enjoyed for its 
own sake, as a sensational luxury? Let us face these 
questions boldly, not shrinking from the fact that cruelty 
is one of the primitive pleasures of mankind, and that the 
detection of its Protean disguises as law, education, medi- 
cine, discipline, sport and so forth, is one of the most 
difficult of the unending tasks of the legislator. 



Preface on Doctors xlv 

Our Own Cruelties 

At first blush it may seem not only unnecessary, but 
even indecent, to discuss such a proposition as the ele- 
vation of cruelty to the rank of a human right. Unnec- 
essary, because no vivisector confesses to a love of cru- 
elty for its own sake or claims any general fundamental 
right to be cruel. Indecent, because there is an accepted 
convention to repudiate cruelty ; and vivisection is only 
tolerated by the law on condition that, like judicial tor- 
ture, it shall be done as mercifully as the nature of the 
practice allows. But the moment the controversy be- 
comes embittered, the recriminations bandied between the 
opposed parties bring us face-to-face with some very 
ugly truths. On one occasion I was invited to speak at 
a large Anti- Vivisection meeting in the Queen's Hall in 
London. I found myself on the platform with fox hun- 
ters, tame stag hunters, men and women whose calendar 
was divided, not by pay days and quarter days, but by 
seasons for killing animals for sport: the fox, the hare, 
the otter, the partridge and the rest having each its ap- 
pointed date for slaughter. The ladies among us wore 
hats and cloaks and head-dresses obtained by wholesale 
massacres, ruthless trappings, callous extermination of 
our fellow creatures. We insisted on our butchers sup- 
plying us with white veal, and were large and constant 
consumers of pate de foie grasj both comestibles being 
obtained by revolting methods. We sent our sons to pub- 
lic schools where indecent flogging is a recognized 
method of taming the young human animal. Yet we were 
all in hysterics of indignation at the cruelties of the vivi- 
sectors. These, if any were present, must have smiled 
sardonically at such inhuman humanitarians, whose daily 
habits and fashionable amusements cause more suffering 
in England in a week than all the vivisectors of Europe 
do in a year. I made a very effective speech, not exclu- 



xlvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

sively against vivisection, but against cruelty; and I have 
never been asked to speak since by that Society, nor do 
I expect to be, as I should probably give such offence to 
its most affluent subscribers that its attempts to suppress 
vivisection would be seriously hindered. But that does 
not prevent the vivisectors from freely using the " youre 
another " retort, and using it with justice. 

We must therefore give ourselves no airs of superiority 
when denouncing the cruelties of vivisection. We all do 
just as horrible things, with even less excuse. But in 
making that admission we are also making short work of 
the virtuous airs with which we are sometimes referred 
to the humanity of the medical profession as a guarantee 
that vivisection is not abused — much as if our burglars 
should assure us that they are too honest to abuse the 
practice of burgling. We are, as a matter of fact, a cruel 
nation ; and our habit of disguising our vices by giving 
polite names to the offences we are determined to commit 
does not, unfortunately for my own comfort, impose on 
me. Vivisectors can hardly pretend to be better than 
the classes from which they are drawn, or those above 
them; and if these classes are capable of sacrificing ani- 
mals in various cruel ways imder cover of sport, fashion, 
education, discipline, and even, when the cruel sacrifices 
are human sacrifices, of political economy, it is idle for 
the vivisector to pretend that he is incapable of practis- 
ing cruelty for pleasure or profit or both under the cloak 
of science. We are all tarred with the same brush; and 
the vivisectors are not slow to remind us of it, and to 
protest vehemently against being branded as exception- 
ally cruel and as devisers of horrible instruments of tor- 
ture by people whose main notion of enjoyment is cruel 
sport, and whose requirements in the way of villainously 
cruel traps occupy pages of the catalogue of the Army 
and Navy Stores. 



Preface on Doctors xlvii 

The Scientific Investigation of Cruelty 

There is in man a specific lust for cruelty which infects 
even his passion of pity and makes it savage. Simple 
disgust at cruelty is very rare. The people who turn sick 
and faint and those who gloat are often alike in the pains 
they take to witness executions, floggings, operations or 
any other exhibitions of suffering, especially those in- 
volving bloodshed, blows, and laceration. A craze for 
cruelty can be developed just as a craze for drink can; 
and nobody who attempts to ignore cruelty as a possible 
factor in the attraction of vivisection and even of anti- 
vivisection, or in the credulity with which we accept its 
excuses, can be regarded as a scientific investigator of it. 
Those who accuse vivisectors of indulging the well- 
known passion of cruelty under the cloak of research are 
therefore putting forward a strictly scientific psycho- 
logical hypothesis, which is also simple, human, obvious, 
and probable. It may be as wounding to the personal 
vanity of the vivisector as Darwin's Origin of Species 
was to the people who could not bear to think that they 
were cousins to the monkeys (remember Goldsmith's an- 
ger when he was told that he could not move his upper 
jaw) ; but science has to consider only the truth of the 
hypothesis, and not whether conceited people will like 
it or not. In vain do the sentimental champions of vivi- 
section declare themselves the most humane of men, in- 
flicting suffering only to relieve it, scrupulous in the use 
of anesthetics, and void of all passion except the passion 
of pity for a disease-ridden world. The really scientific 
investigator answers that the question cannot be settled 
by hysterical protestations, and that if the vivisectionist 
rejects deductive reasoning, he had better clear his char- 
acter by his own favorite method of experiment. 



xlviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

Suggested Laboratory Tests of the 

Vivisector's Emotions 

Take the hackneyed case of the Italian who tortured 
mice, ostensibly to find out about the effects of pain 
rather less than the nearest dentist could have told him, 
and who boasted of the ecstatic sensations (he actually 
used the word love) with which he carried out his experi- 
ments. Or the gentleman who starved sixty dogs to death 
to establish the fact that a dog deprived of food gets 
progressively lighter and weaker, becoming remarkably 
emaciated, and finally dying : an undoubted truth, but as- 
certainable without laboratory experiments by a simple 
enquiry addressed to the nearest policeman, or, failing 
him, to any sane person in Europe. The Italian is diag- 
nosed as a cruel voluptuary: the dog-starver is passed 
over as such a hopeless fool that it is impossible to take 
any interest in him. Why not test the diagnosis scien- 
tifically? Why not perform a careful series of experi- 
ments on persons under the influence of voluptuous 
ecstasy, so as to ascertain its physiological symptoms? 
Then perform a second series on persons engaged in 
mathematical work or machine designing, so as to ascer- 
tain the symptoms of cold scientific activity? Then note 
the symptoms of a vivisector performing a cruel experi- 
ment; and compare them with the voluptuary symptoms 
and the mathematical symptoms? Such experiments 
would be quite as interesting and important as any yet 
undertaken by the vivisectors. They might open a line 
of investigation which would finally make, for instance, 
the ascertainment of the guilt or innocence of an accused 
person a much exacter process than the very fallible 
methods of our criminal courts. But instead of propos- 
ing such an investigation, our vivisectors offer us all the 
pious protestations and all the huffy recriminations that 



Preface on Doctors xlix 

any common unscientific mortal offers when he is accused 
of unworthy conduct. 

Routine 

Yet most vivisectors would probably come triumphant 
out of such a series of experiments, because vivisection 
is now a routine, like butchering or hanging or flogging ; 
and many of the men who practise it do so only because 
it has been established as part of the profession they have 
adopted. Far from enjoying it, they have simply over- 
come their natural repugnance and become indifferent to 
it, as men inevitably become indifferent to anything they 
do often enough. It is this dangerous power of custom 
that makes it so difficult to convince the common sense 
of mankind that any established commercial or profes- 
sional practice has its root in passion. Let a routine once 
spring from passion, and you will presently find thou- 
sands of routineers following it passionlessly for a liveli- 
hood. Thus it always seems strained to speak of the re^ 
ligious convictions of a clergyman, because nine out of 
ten clergymen have no religious convictions: they are 
ordinary officials carrying on a routine of baptizing, 
marrying, and churching; praying, reciting, and preach- 
ing; and, like solicitors or doctors, getting away from 
their duties with relief to hunt, to garden, to keep bees, 
to go into society, and the like. In the same way many 
people do cruel and vile things without being in the least 
cruel or vile, because the routine to which they have been 
brought up is superstitiously cruel and vile. To say that 
every man who beats his children and every schoolmaster 
who flogs a pupil is a conscious debauchee is absurd: 
thousands of dull, conscientious people beat their chil- 
dren conscientiously, because they were beaten themselves 
and think children ought to be beaten. The ill-tempered 
vulgarity that instinctively strikes at and hurts a thing 



1 The Doctor's Dilemma 

that annoys it (and all children are annoying), and the 
simple stupidity that requires from a child perfection be- 
yond the reach of the wisest and best adults (perfect 
truthfulness coupled with perfect obedience is quite a 
common condition of leaving a child unwhipped), pro- 
duce a good deal of flagellation among people who not 
only do not lust after it, but who hit the harder because 
they are angry at having to perform an uncomfortable 
duty. These people will beat merely to assert their au- 
thority, or to carry out what they conceive to be a divine 
order on the strength of the precept of Solomon recorded 
in the Bible, which carefully adds that Solomon com- 
pletely spoilt his own son and turned away from the god 
of his fathers to the sensuous idolatry in which he ended 
his days. 

In the same way we find men and women practising 
vivisection as senselessly as a humane butcher, who adores 
his fox terrier, will cut a calf's throat and hang it up by 
its heels to bleed slowly to death because it is the custom 
to eat veal and insist on its being white ; or as a German 
purveyor nails a goose to a board and stufifs it with food 
because fashionable people eat pate de foie gras; or as 
the crew of a whaler breaks in on a colony of seals and 
clubs them to death in wholesale massacre because ladies 
want sealskin jackets; or as fanciers blind singing birds 
with hot needles, and mutilate the ears and tails of dogs 
and horses. Let cruelty or kindness or anything else 
once become customary and it will be practised by people 
to whom it is not at all natural, but whose rule of life is 
simply to do only what everybody else, does, and who 
would lose their employment and starve if they indulged 
in any peculiarity. A respectable man will lie daily, in 
speech and in print, about the qualities of the article he 
lives by selling, because it is customary to do so. He 
will flog his boy for telling a lie, because it is customary 
to do so. He will also flog him for not telling a lie if 



Preface on Doctors li 

the boy tells inconvenient or disrespectful truths, because 
it is customary to do so. He will give the same boy a 
present on his birthday, and buy him a spade and bucket 
at the seaside, because it is customary to do so, being all 
the time neither particularly mendacious, nor particularly 
cruel, nor particularly generous, but simply incapable of 
ethical judgment or independent action. 

Just so do we find a crowd of petty vivisectionists daily 
committing atrocities and stupidities, because it is the 
custom to do so. Vivisection is customary as part of the 
routine of preparing lectures in medical schools. For in- 
stance, there are two ways of making the action of the 
heart visible to students. One, a barbarous, ignorant, 
and thoughtless way, is to stick little flags into a rabbit's 
heart and let the students see the flags jump. The other, 
an elegant, ingenious, well-informed, and instructive 
way, is to put a sphygmograph on the student's wrist and 
let him see a record of his heart's action traced by a 
needle on a slip of smoked paper. But it has become the 
custom for lecturers to teach from the rabbit; and the 
lecturers are not original enough to get out of their 
groove. Then there are the demonstrations which are 
made by cutting up frogs with scissors. The most hu- 
mane man, however repugnant the operation may be to 
him at first, cannot do it at lecture after lecture for 
months without finally — and that very soon — feeling no 
more for the frog than if he were cutting up pieces of 
paper. Such clumsy and lazy ways of teaching are based 
on the cheapness of frogs and rabbits. If machines were 
as cheap as frogs, engineers would not only be taught the 
anatomy of machines and the functions of their parts: 
they would also have machines misused and wrecked 
before them so that they might learn as much as possible 
by using their eyes, and as little as possible by using 
their brains and imaginations. Thus we have, as part of 
the routine of teaching, a routine of vivisection which 



lii The Doctor's Dilemma 

soon produces complete indifference to it on the part even 
of those who are naturally humane. If they pass on 
from the routine of lecture preparation, not into general 
practice, but into research work, they carry this acquired 
indifference with them into the laboratory, where any 
atrocity is possible, because all atrocities satisfy curiosity. 
The routine man is in the majority in his profession al- 
ways: consequently the moment his practice is tracked 
down to its source in human passion there is a great and 
quite sincere poohpoohing from himself, from the mass 
of the profession, and from the mass of the public, which 
sees that the average doctor is much too commonplace 
and decent a person to be capable of passionate wicked- 
ness of any kind. 

Here then, we have in vivisection, as in all the other 
tolerated and instituted cruelties, this anti-climax: that 
only a negligible percentage of those who practise and 
consequently defend it get any satisfaction out of it. As 
in Mr. Galsworthy's play Justice the useless and detest- 
able torture of solitary imprisonment is shewn at its worst 
without the introduction of a single cruel person into the 
drama, so it would be possible to represent all the tor- 
ments of vivisection dramatically without introducing a 
single vivisector who had not felt sick at his first experi- 
ence in the laboratory. Not that this can exonerate any 
vivisector from suspicion of enjoying his work (or her 
work: a good deal of the vivisection in medical schools is 
done by women). In every autobiography which records 
a real experience of school or prison life, we find that here 
and there among the routineers there is to be found the 
genuine amateur, the orgiastic flogging schoolmaster or 
the nagging warder, who has sought out a cruel profession 
for the sake of its cruelty. But it is the genuine routineer 
who is the bulwark of the practice, because, though you 
can excite public fury against a Sade, a Bluebeard, or a 
Nero, you cannot rouse any feeling against dull Mr. 



Preface on Doctors liii 

Smith doing his duty : that is, doing the usual thing. He 
is so obviously no better and no worse than anyone else 
that it is difficult to conceive that the things he does are 
abominable. If you would see public dislike surging up 
in a moment against an individual, you must watch one 
who does something unusual, no matter how sensible it 
may be. The name of Jonas Hanway lives as that of a 
brave man because he was the first who dared to appear 
in the streets of this rainy island with an umbrella. 

The Old Line between Man and Beast 

But there is still a distinction to be clung to by those 
who dare not tell themselves the truth about the medical 
profession because they are so helplessly dependent on 
it when death threatens the household. That distinction 
is the line that separates the brute from the man in the 
old classification. Granted, they will plead, that we are 
all cruel ; yet the tame-stag-himter does not hunt men ; 
and the sportsman who lets a leash of greyhoimds loose 
on a hare would be horrified at the thought of letting 
them loose on a human child. The lady who gets her 
cloak by flaying a sable does not flay a negro; nor does 
it ever occur to her that her veal cutlet might be im- 
proved on by a slice of tender baby. 

Now there was a time when some trust could be placed 
in this distinction. The Roman Catholic Church still 
maintains, with what it must permit me to call a stupid 
obstinacy, and in spite of St. Francis and St. Anthony, 
that animals have no souls and no rights ; so that you 
cannot sin against an animal, or against God by any- 
thing you may choose to do to an animal. Resisting the 
temptation to enter on an argument as to whether you 
may not sin against your own soul if you are imjust or 
cruel to the least of those whom St. Francis called his 
little brothers, I have only to point out here that noth- 



liv The Doctor's Dilemma 

ing could be more despicably superstitious in the opinion 
of a vivisector than the notion that science recognizes 
any such step in evolution as the step from a physical 
organism to an immortal soul. That conceit has been 
taken out of all our men of science, and out of all our 
doctors, by the evolutionists; and when it is considered 
how completely obsessed biological science has become 
in our days, not by the full scope of evolution, but by 
that particular method of it which has neither sense nor 
purpose nor life nor anything human, much less godlike, 
in it: by the method, that is, of so-called Natural Selec- 
tion (meaning no selection at all, but mere dead accident 
and luck), the folly of trusting to vivisectors to hold 
the human animal any more sacred than the other ani- 
mals becomes so clear that it would be waste of time to 
insist further on it. As a matter of fact the man who 
once concedes to the vivisector the right to put a dog 
outside the laws of honor and fellowship, concedes to 
him also the right to put himself outside them ; for he is 
nothing to the vivisector but a more highly developed, 
and consequently more interesting-to-experiment-on ver- 
tebrate than the dog. 

Vivisecting the Human Subject 

I have in my hand a printed and published account by 
a doctor of how he tested his remedy for pulmonary tu- 
berculosis, which was, to inject a powerful germicide 
directly into the circulation by stabbing a vein with a 
syringe. He was one of those doctors who are able to 
command public sympathy by saying, quite truly, that 
when they discovered that the proposed treatment was 
dangerous, they experimented thenceforth on themselves. 
In this case the doctor was devoted enough to carry his 
experiments to the point of running serious risks, and 
actually making himself very uncomfortable. But he 



Preface on Doctors Iv 

did not begin with himself. His first experiment was 
on two hospital patients. On receiving a message from 
the hospital to the effect that these two martyrs to thera- 
peutic science had all but expired in convulsions, he 
experimented on a rabbit, which instantly dropped dead. 
It was then, and not until then, that he began to ex- 
periment on himself, with the germicide modified in the 
direction indicated by the experiments made on the two 
patients and the rabbit. As a good many people coun- 
tenance vivisection because they fear that if the experi- 
ments are not made on rabbits they will be made on 
themselves, it is worth noting that in this case, where 
both rabbits and men were equally available, the men, 
being, of course, enormously more instructive, and cost- 
ing nothing, were experimented on first. Once grant the 
ethics of the vivisectionists and you not only sanction the 
experiment on the human subject, but make it the first 
duty of the vivisector. If a guinea pig may be sacrificed 
for the sake of the very little that can be learnt from it, 
shall not a man be sacrificed for the sake of the great 
deal that can be learnt from him? At all events, he is 
sacrificed, as this typical case shows. I may add (not 
that it touches the argument) that the doctor, the pa- 
tients, and the rabbit all suffered in vain, as far as the 
hoped-for rescue of the race from pulmonary consump- 
tion is concerned. 



" The Lie is a European Power " 

Now at the very time when the lectures describing 
these experiments were being circulated in print and 
discussed eagerly by the medical profession, the custo- 
mary denials that patients are experimented on were as 
loud, as indignant, as high-minded as ever, in spite of 
the few intelligent doctors who point out rightly that 
all treatments are experiments on the patient. And this 



Ivi The Doctor's Dilemma 

brings us to an obvious but mostly overlooked weakness 
in the vivisector's position : that is, his inevitable for- 
feiture of all claim to have his word believed. It is 
hardly to be expected that a man who does not hesitate 
to vivisect for the sake of science will hesitate to lie 
about it afterwards to protect it from what he deems 
the ignorant sentimentality of the laity. When the pub- 
lic conscience stirs uneasily and threatens suppression, 
there is never wanting some doctor of eminent position 
and high character who will sacrifice himself devotedly 
to the cause of science by coming forward to assure the 
public on his honor that all experiments on animals are 
completely painless; although he must know that the 
very experiments which first provoked the anti-vivisec- 
tion movement by their atrocity were experiments to 
ascertain the physiological effects of the sensation of 
extreme pain (the much more interesting physiology of 
pleasure remains uninvestigated) and that all experi- 
ments in which sensation is a factor are voided by its 
suppression. Besides, vivisection may be painless in 
cases where the experiments are very cruel. If a person 
scratches me with a poisoned dagger so gently that I do 
not feel the scratch, he has achieved a painless vivisec- 
tion ; but if I presently die in torment I am not likely 
to consider that his humanity is amply vindicated by 
his gentleness. A cobra's bite hurts so little that the 
creature is almost, legally speaking, a vivisector who 
inflicts no pain. By giving his victims chloroform before 
biting them he could comply with the law completely. 

Here, then, is a pretty deadlock. Public support of 
vivisection is founded almost wholly on the assurances of 
the vivisectors that great public benefits may be expected 
from the practice. Not for a moment do I suggest that 
such a defence would be valid even if proved. But when 
the witnesses begin by alleging that in the cause of 
science all the customary ethical obligations (which in- 



Preface on Doctors Ivii 

elude the obligation to tell the truth) are suspended, 
what weight can any reasonable person give to their 
testimony? I would rather swear fifty lies than take an 
animal which had licked my hand in good fellowship and 
torture it. If I did torture the dog, I should certainly 
not have the face to turn round and ask how any person 
dare suspect an honorable man like myself of telling lies. 
Most sensible and humane people would, I hope, reply 
flatly that honorable men do not behave dishonorably 
even to dogs. The murderer who, when asked by the 
chaplain whether he had any other crimes to confess, 
replied indignantly, "What do you take me for?" re- 
minds us very strongly of the vivisectors who are so 
deeply hurt when their evidence is set aside as worthless. 

An Argument which would Defend any 
Crime 

The Achilles heel of vivisection, however, is not to be 
found in the pain it causes, but in the line of argument 
by which it is justified. The medical code regarding it is 
simply criminal anarchism at its very worst. Indeed no 
criminal has yet had the impudence to argue as every 
vivisector argues. No burglar contends that as it is ad- 
mittedly important to have money to spend, and as the 
object of burglary is to provide the burglar with money 
to spend, and as in many instances it has achieved this 
object, therefore the burglar is a public benefactor and 
the police are ignorant sentimentalists. No highway 
robber has yet harrowed us with denunciations of the 
puling moralist who allows his child to suffer all the 
evils of poverty because certain faddists think it dis- 
honest to garotte an alderman. Thieves and assassins 
understand quite well that there are paths of acquisition, 
even of the best things, that are barred to all men of 
honor. Again, has the silliest burglar ever pretended 



Iviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

that to put a stop to burglary is to put a stop to indus- 
try? All the vivisections that have been performed since 
the world began have produced nothing so important as 
the innocent and honorable discovery of radiography; 
and one of the reasons why radiography was not discov- 
ered sooner was that the men whose business it was to 
discover new clinical methods were coarsening and stupe- 
fying themselves with the sensual villanies and cut- 
throat's casuistries of vivisection. The law of the con- 
servation of energy holds good in physiology as in other 
things: every vivisector is a deserter from the army of 
honorable investigators. But the vivisector does not see 
this. He not only calls his methods scientific: he con- 
tends that there are no other scientific methods. When 
you express your natural loathing for his cruelty and 
your natural contempt for his stupidity, he imagines that 
you are attacking science. Yet he has no inkling of the 
method and temper of science. The point at issue being 
plainly whether he is a rascal or not, he not only insists 
that the real point is whether some hotheaded anti- 
vivisectionist is a liar (which he proves by ridiculously 
unscientific assumptions as to the degree of accuracy 
attainable in human statement), but never dreams of 
ojBfering any scientific evidence by his own methods. 

There are many paths to knowledge already discov- 
ered; and no enlightened man doubts that there are 
many more waiting to be discovered. Indeed, all paths 
lead to knowledge; because even the vilest and stupidest 
action teaches us something about vileness and stupidity, 
and may accidentally teach us a good deal more: for 
instance, a cutthroat learns (and perhaps teaches) the 
anatomy of the carotid artery and jugular vein; and 
there can be no question that the burning of St. Joan of 
Arc must have been a most instructive and interesting 
experiment to a good observer, and could have been 
made more so if it had been carried out by skilled physi- 



Preface on Doctors lix 

ologists under laboratory conditions. The earthquake in 
San Francisco proved invaluable as an experiment in 
the stability of giant steel buildings; and the ramming 
of the Victoria by the Camperdown settled doubtful 
points of the greatest importance in naval warfare. Ac- 
cording to vivisectionist logic our builders would be 
justified in producing artificial earthquakes with dyna- 
mite, and our admirals in contriving catastrophes at 
naval manoeuvres, in order to follow up the line of re- 
search thus accidentally discovered. 

The truth is, if the acquisition of knowledge justifies 
every sort of conduct, it justifies any sort of conduct, 
from the illumination of Nero's feasts by burning human 
beings alive (another interesting experiment) to the sim- 
plest act of kindness. And in the light of that truth it 
is clear that the exemption of the pursuit of knowledge 
from the laws of honor is the most hideous conceivable 
enlargement of anarchy; worse, by far, than an exemp- 
tion of the pursuit of money or political power, since 
these can hardly be attained without some regard for 
at least the appearances of human welfare, whereas a 
curious devil might destroy the whole race in torment, 
acquiring knowledge all the time from his highly inter- 
esting experiment. There is more danger in one respect- 
able scientist countenancing such a monstrous claim than 
in fifty assassins or dynamitards. The man who makes 
it is ethically imbecile ; and whoever imagines that it is a 
scientific claim has not the faintest conception of what 
science means. The paths to knowledge are countless. 
One of these paths is a path through darkness, secrecy, 
and cruelty. When a man deliberately turns from all 
other paths and goes down that one, it is scientific to 
infer that what attracts him is not knowledge, since 
there are other paths to that, but cruelty. With so 
strong and scientific a case against him, it is childish 
for him to stand on his honor and reputation and high 



Ix The Doctor's Dilemma 

character and the credit of a noble profession and so 
forth: he must clear himself either by reason or by ex- 
periment, unless he boldly contends that evolution has 
retained a passion of cruelty in man just because it is 
indispensable to the fulness of his knowledge. 

Thou Art The Man 

I shall not be at all surprised if what I have written 
above has induced in sympathetic readers a transport of 
virtuous indignation at the expense of the medical pro- 
fession. I shall not damp so creditable and salutary a 
sentiment; but I must point out that the guilt is shared 
by all of us. It is not in his capacity of healer and man 
of science that the doctor vivisects or defends vivisection, 
but in his entirely vulgar lay capacity. He is made of 
the same clay as the ignorant, shallow, credulous, half- 
miseducated, pecuniarily anxious people who call him in 
when they have tried in vain every bottle and every pill 
the advertizing druggist can persuade them to buy. The 
real remedy for vivisection is the remedy for all the 
mischief that the medical profession and all the other 
professions are doing: namely, more knowledge. The 
juries which send the poor Peculiars to prison, and give 
vivisectionists heavy damages against humane persons 
who accuse them of cruelty; the editors and councillors 
and student-led mobs who are striving to make Vivisec- 
tion one of the watchwords of our civilization, are not 
doctors: they are the British public, all so afraid to die 
that they will cling frantically to any idol which prom- 
ises to cure all their diseases, and crucify anyone who 
tells them that they must not only die when their time 
comes, but die like gentlemen. In their paroxysms of 
cowardice and selfishness they force the doctors to humor 
their folly and ignorance. How complete and inconsid- 
erate their ignorance is can only be realized by those 



Preface on Doctors Ixi 

who have some knowledge of vital statistics, and of the 
illusions which beset Public Health legislation. 



What the Public Wants and Will Not Get 

The demands of this poor public are not reasonable, 
but they are quite simple. It dreads disease and desires 
to be protected against it. But it is poor and wants to be 
protected cheaply. Scientific measures are too hard to 
understand, too costly, too clearly tending towards a rise 
in the rates and more public interference with the in- 
sanitary, because insufficiently financed, private house. 
What the public wants, therefore, is a cheap magic 
charm to prevent, and a cheap pill or potion to cure, all 
disease. It forces all such charms on the doctors. 



The Vaccination Craze 

Thus it was really the public and not the medical pro- 
fession that took up vaccination with irresistible faith, 
sweeping the invention out of Jenner's hand and estab- 
lishing it in a form which he himself repudiated. Jenner 
was not a man of science; but he was not a fool; and 
when he found that people who had suffered from cow- 
pox either by contagion in the milking shed or by vac- 
cination, were not, as he had supposed, immune from 
smallpox, he ascribed the cases of immunity which had 
formerly misled him to a disease of the horse, which, 
jDerhaps because we do not drink its milk and eat its 
flesh, is kept at a greater distance in our imagination than 
our foster mother the cow. At all events, the public, 
which had been boundlessly credulous about the cow, 
would not have the horse on any terms ; and to this day 
the law which prescribes Jennerian vaccination is carried 
out with an anti-Jennerian inoculation because the pub- 



Ixii The Doctor's Dilemma 

lie would have it so in spite of Jenner. All the grossest 
lies and superstitions which have disgraced the vaccina- 
tion craze were taught to the doctors by the public. It 
was not the doctors who first began to declare that all 
our old men remember the time when almost every face 
they saw in the street was horribly pitted with smallpox, 
and that all this disfigurement has vanished since the 
introduction of vaccination. Jenner himself alluded to 
this imaginary phenomenon before the introduction of 
vaccination, and attributed it to the older practice of 
smallpox inoculation, by which Voltaire, Catherine II, 
and Lady Mary Wortley Montagu so confidently ex- 
pected to see the disease made harmless. It was not 
Jenner who set people declaring that smallpox, if not 
abolished by vaccination, had at least been made much 
milder : on the contrary, he recorded a pre-vaccination 
epidemic in which none of the persons attacked went to 
bed or considered themselves as seriously ill. Neither 
Jenner, nor any other doctor ever, as far as I know, 
inculcated the popular notion that everybody got small- 
pox as a matter of course before vaccination was in- 
vented. That doctors get infected with these delusions, 
and are in their unprofessional capacity as members of 
the public subject to them like other men, is true; but 
if we had to decide whether vaccination was first forced 
on the public by the doctors or on the doctors by the 
public, we should have to decide against the public. 

Statistical Illusions 

Public ignorance of the laws of evidence and of statis- 
tics can hardly be exaggerated. There may be a doctor 
here and there who in dealing with the statistics of 
disease has taken at least the first step towards sanity 
by grasping the fact that as an attack of even the com- 
monest disease is an exceptional event, apparently over- 



Preface on Doctors Ixiii 

whelming statistical evidence in favor of any prophy- 
lactic can be produced by persuading the public that 
everybody caught the disease formerly. Thus if a dis- 
ease is one which normally attacks fifteen per cent of the 
population, and if the effect of a prophylactic is actually 
to increase the proportion to twenty per cent, the pub- 
lication of this figure of twenty per cent will convince 
the public that the prophylactic has reduced the per- 
centage by eighty per cent instead of increasing it by 
five, because the public, left to itself and to the old gen- 
tlemen who are always ready to remember, on every pos- 
sible subject, that things used to be much worse than 
they are now (such old gentlemen greatly outnumber the 
laudatores tempori acti), will assume that the former 
percentage was about 100. The vogue of the Pasteur 
treatment of hydrophobia, for instance, was due to the 
assumption by the public that every person bitten by a 
rabid dog necessarily got hydrophobia. I myself heard 
hydrophobia discussed in my youth by doctors in Dublin 
before a Pasteur Institute existed, the subject having 
been brought forward there by the scepticism of an emi- 
nent surgeon as to whether hydrophobia is really a 
specific disease or only ordinary tetanus induced (as 
tetanus was then supposed to be induced) by a lacerated 
wound. There were no statistics available as to the pro- 
portion of dog bites that ended in hydrophobia; but 
nobody ever guessed that the cases could be more than 
two or three per cent of the bites. On me, therefore, the 
results published by the Pasteur Institute produced no 
such effect as they did on the ordinary man who thinks 
that the bite of a mad dog means certain hydrophobia. 
It seemed to me that the proportion of deaths among the 
cases treated at the Institute was rather higher, if any- 
thing, than might have been expected had there been no 
Institute in existence. But to the public every Pasteur 
patient who did not die was miraculously saved from an 



Ixiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

agonizing death by the beneficent white magic of that 
most trusty of all wizards, the man of science. 

Even trained statisticians often fail to appreciate the 
extent to which statistics are vitiated by the unrecorded 
assumptions of their interpreters. Their attention is too 
much occupied with the cruder tricks of those who make 
a corrupt use of statistics for advertizing purposes. 
There is, for example, the percentage dodge. In some 
hamlet, barely large enough to have a name, two people 
are attacked during a smallpox epidemic. One dies: the 
other recovers. One has vaccination marks : the other 
has none. Immediately either the vaccinists or the anti- 
vaccinists publish the triumphant news that at such and 
such a place not a single vaccinated person died of small- 
pox whilst 100 per cent of the unvaccinated perished 
miserably; or, as the case may be, that 100 per cent of 
the unvaccinated recovered whilst the vaccinated suc- 
cumbed to the last man. Or, to take another common in- 
stance, comparisons which are really comparisons be- 
tween two social classes with different standards of 
nutrition and education are palmed off as comparisons 
between the results of a certain medical treatment and 
its neglect. Thus it is easy to prove that the wearing 
of tall hats and the carrying of umbrellas enlarges the 
chest, prolongs life, and confers comparative immunity 
from disease; for the statistics shew that the classes 
which use these articles are bigger, healthier, and live 
longer than the class which never dreams of possessing 
such things. It does not take much perspicacity to see 
that what really makes this difference is not the tall hat 
and the umbrella, but the wealth and nourishment of 
which they are evidence, and that a gold watch or mem- 
bership of a club in Pall Mall might be proved in the 
same way to have the like sovereign virtues. A univer- 
sity degree, a daily bath, the owning of thirty pairs of 
trousers^ a knowledge of Wagner's music, a pew in 



Preface on Doctors Ixv 

church, anything, in short, that implies more means and 
better nurture than the mass of laborers enjoy, can be 
statistically palmed off as a magic-spell conferring all 
sorts of privileges. 

In the case of a prophylactic enforced by law, this 
illusion is intensified grotesquely, because only vagrants 
can evade it. Now vagrants have little power of resist- 
ing any disease: their death rate and their case-mortal- 
ity rate is always high relatively to that of respectable 
folk. Nothing is easier, therefore, than to prove that 
compliance with any public regulation produces the most 
gratifying results. It would be equally easy even if the 
regulation actually raised the death-rate, provided it did 
not raise it sufficiently to make the average householder, 
who cannot evade regulations, die as early as the average 
vagrant who can. 

The Surprises of Attention and Neglect 

There is another statistical illusion which is inde- 
pendent of class differences. A common complaint of 
houseowners is that the Public Health Authorities fre- 
quently compel them to instal costly sanitary appliances 
which are condemned a few years later as dangerous to 
health, and forbidden under penalties. Yet these dis- 
carded mistakes are always made in the first instance on 
the strength of a demonstration that their introduction 
has reduced the death-rate. The explanation is simple. 
Suppose a law were made that every child in the nation 
should be compelled to drink a pint of brandy per 
month, but that the brandy must be administered only 
when the child was in good health, with its digestion 
and so forth working normally, and its teeth either nat- 
urally or artificially sound. Probably the result would 
be an immediate and startling reduction in child mor- 
tality, leading to further legislation increasing the quan- 



Ixvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

tity of brandy to a gallon. Not until the brandy craze 
had been carried to a point at which the direct harm 
done by it would outweigh the incidental good, would an 
anti-brandy party be listened to. That incidental good 
would be the substitution of attention to the general 
health of children for the neglect which is now the rule 
so long as the child is not actually too sick to run about 
and play as usual. Even if this attention were confined 
to the children's teeth, there would be an improvement 
which it would take a good deal of brandy to cancel. 

This imaginary case explains the actual case of the 
sanitary appliances which our local sanitary authorities 
prescribe today and condemn tomorrow. No sanitary 
contrivance which the mind of even the very worst 
plumber can devize could be as disastrous as that total 
neglect for long periods which gets avenged by pesti- 
lences that sweep through whole continents, like the 
black death and the cholera. If it were proposed at this 
time of day to discharge all the sewage of London crude 
and untreated into the Thames, instead of carrying it, 
after elaborate treatment, far out into the North Sea, 
there would be a shriek of horror from all our experts. 
Yet if Cromwell had done that instead of doing nothing, 
there would probably have been no Great Plague of Lon- 
don. When the Local Health Authority forces every 
householder to have his sanitary arrangements thought 
about and attended to by somebody whose special busi- 
ness it is to attend to such things, then it matters not 
how erroneous or even directly mischievous may be the 
specific measures taken: the net result at first is sure 
to be an improvement. Not until attention has been 
effectually substituted for neglect as the general rule, 
will the statistics begin to shew the merits of the par- 
ticular methods of attention adopted. And as we are far 
from having arrived at this stage, being as to health 
legislation only at the beginning of things, we have prac- 



Preface on Doctors Ixvii 

tically no evidence yet as to the value of methods. Sim- 
ple and obvious as this is, nobody seems as yet to dis- 
count the effect of substituting attention for neglect in 
drawing conclusions from health statistics. Everything 
is put to the credit of the particular method employed, 
although it may quite possibly be raising the death rate 
by five per thousand whilst the attention incidental to it 
is reducing the death rate fifteen per thousand. The net 
gain of ten per thousand is credited to the method^ and 
made the excuse for enforcing more of it. 

Stealing Credit from Civilization 

There is yet another way in which specifics which have 
no merits at all, either direct or incidental, may be 
brought into high repute by statistics. For a century 
past civilization has been cleaning away the conditions 
which favor bacterial fevers. Typhus, once rife, has van- 
ished: plague and cholera have been stopped at our fron- 
tiers by a sanitary blockade. We still have epidemics of 
smallpox and typhoid ; and diphtheria and scarlet fever 
are endemic in the slums. Measles, which in my child- 
hood was not regarded as a dangerous disease, has now 
become so mortal that notices are posted publicly urging 
parents to take it seriously. But even in these cases the 
contrast between the death and recovery rates in the rich 
districts and in the poor ones has led to the general con- 
viction among experts that bacterial diseases are preventi- 
ble; and they already are to a large extent prevented. 
The dangers of infection and the way to avoid it are bet- 
ter understood than they used to be. It is barely twenty 
years since people exposed themselves recklessly to the 
infection of consumption and pneumonia in the belief that 
these diseases were not " catching." Nowadays the 
troubles of consumptive patients are greatly increased by 
the growing disposition to treat them as lepers. No 



Ixviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

doubt there is a good deal of ignorant exaggeration and 
cowardly refusal to face a human and necessary share of 
the risk. That has always been the case. We now know 
that the medieval horror of leprosy was out of all pro- 
portion to the danger of infection, and was accompanied 
by apparent blindness to the infectiousness of smallpox, 
which has since been worked up by our disease terror- 
ists into the position formerly held by leprosy. But the 
scare of infection, though it sets even doctors talking as 
if the only really scientific thing to do with a fever pa- 
tient is to throw him into the nearest ditch and pump 
carbolic acid on him from a safe distance until he is ready 
to be cremated on the spot, has led to much greater care 
and cleanliness. And the net result has been a series of 
victories over disease. 

Now let us suppose that in the early nineteenth cen- 
tury somebody had come forward with a theory that 
typhus fever always begins in the top joint of the little 
finger; and that if this joint be amputated immediately 
after birth, typhus fever will disappear. Had such a 
suggestion been adopted, the theory would have been tri- 
umphantly confirmed; for as a matter of fact, typhus 
fever has disappeared. On the other hand cancer and 
madness have increased (statistically) to an appalling 
extent. The opponents of the little finger theory would 
therefore be pretty sure to allege that the amputations 
were spreading cancer and lunacy. The vaccination con- 
troversy is full of such contentions. So is the contro- 
versy as to the docking of horses' tails and the cropping 
of dogs' ears. So is the less widely known controversy 
as to circumcision and the declaring certain kinds of flesh 
unclean by the Jews. To advertize any remedy or opera- 
tion, you have only to pick out all the most reassuring 
advances made by civilization, and boldly present the two 
in the relation of cause and effect: the public will swal- 
low the fallacy without a wry face. It has no idea of the 



Preface on Doctors Ixix 

need for what is called a control experiment. In Shake- 
spear's time and for long after it, mummy was a favorite 
medicament. You took a pinch of the dust of a dead 
Egyptian in a pint of the hottest water you could bear 
to drink ; and it did you a great deal of good. This, you 
thought, proved what a sovereign healer mummy was. 
But if you had tried the control experiment of taking the 
hot water without the mummy, you might have found 
the effect exactly the same, and that any hot drink would 
have done as well. 

Biometrika 

Another difficulty about statistics is the technical diffi- 
culty of calculation. Before you can even make a mistake 
in drawing your conclusion from the correlations estab- 
lished by your statistics you must ascertain the correla- 
tions. When I turn over the pages of Biometrika, a 
quarterly journal in which is recorded the work done in 
the field of biological statistics by Professor Karl Pear- 
son and his colleagues, I am out of my depth at the first 
line, because mathematics are to me only a concept: I 
never used a logarithm in my life, and could not under- 
take to extract the square root of four without misgiving. 
I am therefore unable to deny that the statistical ascer- 
tainment of the correlations between one thing and an- 
other must be a very complicated and difficult technical 
business, not to be tackled successfully except by high 
mathematicians ; and I cannot resist Professor Karl Pear- 
son's immense contempt for, and indignant sense of grave 
social danger in, the unskilled guesses of the ordinary 
sociologist. 

Now the man in the street knows nothing of Biome- 
trika : all he knows is that " you can prove anything by 
figures," though he forgets this the moment figures are 
used to prove anything he wants to believe. If he did 



Ixx The Doctor's Dilemma 

take in Biometrika he would probably become abjectly 
credulous as to all the conclusions drawn in it from the 
correlations so learnedly worked out; though the mathe- 
matician whose correlations would fill a Newton with ad- 
miration may, in collecting and accepting data and draw- 
conclusions from them, fall into quite crude errors by 
just such popular oversights as I have been describing. 

Patient-made Therapeutics 

To all these blunders and ignorances doctors are no 
less subject than the rest of us. They are not trained 
in the use of evidence, nor in biometrics, nor in the psy- 
chology of human credulity, nor in the incidence of eco- 
nomic pressure. Further, they must believe, on the whole, 
what their patients believe, just as they must wear the 
sort of hat their patients wear. The doctor may lay 
down the law despotically enough to the patient at points 
where the patient's mind is simply blank; but when the 
patient has a prejudice the doctor must either keep it in 
countenance or lose his patient. If people are persuaded 
that night air is dangerous to health and that fresh air 
makes them catch cold, it will not be possible for a doc- 
tor to make his living in private practice if he prescribes 
ventilation. We have to go back no further than the days 
of The Pickwick Papers to find ourselves in a world 
where people slept in four-post beds with curtains drawn 
closely round to exclude as much air as possible. Had 
Mr. Pickwick's doctor told him that he would be much 
healthier if he slept on a camp bed by an open window, 
Mr. Pickwick would have regarded him as a crank and 
called in another doctor. Had he gone on to forbid Mr. 
Pickwick to drink brandy and water whenever he felt 
chilly, and assured him that if he were deprived of meat 
or salt for a whole year, he would not only not die, but 
would be none the worse, Mr. Pickwick would have fled 



Preface on Doctors Ixxi 

from his presence as from that of a dangerous madman. 
And in these matters the doctor cannot cheat his patient. 
If he has no faith in drugs or vaccination, and the pa- 
tient has, he can cheat him with colored water and pass 
his lancet through the flame of a spirit lamp before 
scratching his arm. But he cannot make him change his 
daily habits without knowing it. 



The Reforms also come from the Laity 

In the main, then, the doctor learns that if he gets 
ahead of the superstitions of his patients he is a ruined 
man ; and the result is that he instinctively takes care not 
to get ahead of them. That is why all the changes come 
from the laity. It was not until an agitation had been 
conducted for many years by laymen, including quacks 
and faddists of all kinds, that the public was sufficiently 
impressed to make it possible for the doctors to open their 
minds and their mouths on the subject of fresh air, cold 
water, temperance, and the rest of the new fashions in 
hygiene. At present the tables have been turned on 
many old prejudices. Plenty of our most popular elderly 
doctors believe that cold tubs in the morning are unnatu- 
ral, exhausting, and rheumatic; that frc;h air is a fad 
and that everybody is the better for a glass or two of 
port wine every day ; but they no longer dare say as much 
until they know exactly where they are; for many very 
desirable patients in country houses have lately been per- 
suaded that their first duty is to get up at six in the 
morning and begin the day by taking a walk barefoot 
through the dewy grass. He who shews the least scep- 
ticism as to this practice is at once suspected of being 
" an old-fashioned doctor," and dismissed to make room 
for a younger man. 

In short, private medical practice is governed not by 



Ixxii The Doctor's Dilemma 

science but by supply and demand; and however scien- 
tific a treatment may be, it cannot hold its place in the 
market if there is no demand for it; nor can the grossest 
quackery be kept off the market if there is a demand 
for it. 

Fashions and Epidemics 

A demand, however, can be inculcated. This is thor- 
oughly understood by fashionable tradesmen, who find 
no difficulty in persuading their customers to renew arti- 
cles that are not worn out and to buy things they do not 
want. By making doctors tradesmen, we compel them to 
learn the tricks of trade; consequently we find that the 
fashions of the year include treatments, operations, and 
particular drugs, as well as hats, sleeves, ballads, and 
games. Tonsils, vermiform appendices, uvulas, even 
ovaries are sacrificed because it is the fashion to get them 
cut out, and because the operations are highly profitable. 
The psychology of fashion becomes a pathology; for the 
cases have every air of being genuine: fashions, after all, 
are only induced epidemics, proving that epidemics can 
be induced by tradesmen, and therefore by doctors. 

The Doctor's Virtues 

It will be admitted that this is a pretty bad state of 
things. And the melodramatic instinct of the public, al- 
ways demanding that every wrong shall have, not its 
remedy, but its villain to be hissed, will blame, not its own 
apathy, superstition, and ignorance, but the depravity of 
the doctors. Nothing could be more unjust or mischiev- 
ous. Doctors, if no better than other men, are certainly 
no worse. I was reproached during the performances of 
The Doctor's Dilemma at the Court Theatre in 1907 be- 
cause I made the artist a rascal, the journalist an illit- 
erate incapable, and all the doctors " angels." But I did 



Preface on Doctors Ixxiii 

not go beyond the warrant of my own experience. It has 
been my hick to have doctors among my friends for 
nearly forty years past (all perfectly aware of my free- 
dom from the usual credulity as to the miraculous powers 
and knowledge attributed to them) ; and though I know 
that there are medical blackguards as well as military, 
legal, and clerical blackguards (one soon finds that out 
when one is privileged to hear doctors talking shop 
among themselves), the fact that I was no more at a loss 
for private medical advice and attendance when I had not 
a penny in my pocket than I was later on when I could 
afford fees on the highest scale, has made it impossible 
for me to share that hostility to the doctor as a man 
which exists and is growing as an inevitable result of the 
present condition of medical practice. Not that the in- 
terest in disease and aberrations which turns some men 
and women to medicine and surgery is not sometimes as 
morbid as the interest in misery and vice which turns 
some others to philanthropy and " rescue work." But 
the true doctor is inspired by a hatred of ill-health, and 
a divine impatience of any waste of vital forces. Unless 
a man is led to medicine or surgery through a very excep- 
tional technical aptitude, or because doctoring is a family 
tradition, or because he regards it unintelligently as a 
lucrative and gentlemanly profession, his motives in 
choosing the career of a healer are clearly generous. 
However actual practice may disillusion and corrupt him, 
his selection in the first instance is not a selection of a 
base character. 

The Doctor's Hardships 

A review of the counts in the indictment I have brought 
against private medical practice will shew that they arise 
out of the doctor's position as a competitive private 
tradesman: that is, out of his poverty and dependence. 



Ixxiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

And it should be borne in mind that doctors are expected 
to treat other people specially well whilst themselves 
submitting to specially inconsiderate treatment. The 
butcher and baker are not expected to feed the hungry 
unless the hungry can pay; but a doctor who allows a 
fellow-creature to suffer or perish without aid is regarded 
as a monster. Even if we must dismiss hospital service 
as really venal, the fact remains that most doctors do a 
good deal of gratuitous work in private practice all 
through their careers. And in his paid work the doctor 
is on a different footing to the tradesman. Although the 
articles he sells, advice and treatment, are the same for 
all classes, his fees have to be graduated like the income 
tax. The successful fashionable doctor may weed his 
poorer patients out from time to time, and finally use the 
College of Physicians to place it out of his own power 
to accept low fees ; but the ordinary general practitioner 
never makes out his bills without considering the taxable 
capacity of his patients. 

Then there is the disregard of his own health and com- 
fort which results from the fact that he is, by the nature 
of his work, an emergency man. We are polite and con- 
siderate to the doctor when there is nothing the matter, 
and we meet him as a friend or entertain him as a guest; 
but when the baby is suffering from croup, or its mother 
has a temperature of 104°, or its grandfather has broken 
his leg, nobody thinks of the doctor except as a healer 
and saviour. He may be hungry, weary, sleepy, run 
down by several successive nights disturbed by that in- 
strument of torture, the night bell; but who ever thinks 
of this in the face of sudden sickness or accident? We 
think no more of the condition of a doctor attending a 
case than of the condition of a fireman at a fire. In other 
occupations night-work is specially recognized and pro- 
vided for. The worker sleeps all day ; has his breakfast 
in the evening; his lunch or dinner at midnight; his din- 



Preface on Doctors Ixxv 

ner or supper before going to bed in the morning; and 
he changes to day-work if he cannot stand night-work. 
But a doctor is expected to work day and night. In 
practices which consist largely of workmen's clubs, and 
in which the patients are therefore taken on wholesale 
terms and very numerous, the unfortunate assistant, or 
the principal if he has no assistant, often does not un- 
dress, knowing that he will be called up before he has 
snatched an hour's sleep. To the strain of such inhuman 
conditions must be added the constant risk of infection. 
One wonders why the impatient doctors do not become 
savage and unmanageable, and the patient ones imbecile. 
Perhaps they do, to some extent. And the pay is 
wretched, and so uncertain that refusal to attend without 
payment in advance becomes often a necessary measure 
of self-defence, whilst the County Court has long ago 
put an end to the tradition that the doctor's fee is an 
honorarium. Even the most eminent physicians, as such 
biographies as those of Paget shew, are sometimes mis- 
erably, inhumanly poor until they are past their prime. 
In short, the doctor needs our help for the moment 
much more than we often need his. The ridicule of 
Moliere, ihe death of a well-informed and clever writer 
like the late Harold Frederic in the hands of Christian 
Scientists (a sort of sealing with his blood of the con- 
temptuous disbelief in and dislike of doctors he had bit- 
terly expressed in his books), the scathing and quite 
justifiable exposure of medical practice in the novel by 
Mr. Maarten Maartens entitled The New Religion: all 
these trouble the doctor very little, and are in any case 
well set off by the popularity of Sir Luke Fildes' famous 
picture, and by the verdicts in which juries from time to 
time express their conviction that the doctor can do no 
wrong. The real woes of the doctor are the shabby coat, 
the wolf at the door, the tyranny of ignorant patients, 
the work-day of 24 hours, and the uselessness of hon- 



Ixxvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

estly prescribing what most of the patients really need: 
that is^ not medicine, but money. 

The Pubhc Doctor 

What then is to be done? 

Fortunately we have not to begin absolutely from the 
beginning: we already have, in the Medical Officer of 
Health, a sort of doctor who is free from the worst hard- 
ships, and consequently from the worst vices, of the pri- 
vate practitioner. His position depends, not on the num- 
ber of people who are ill, and whom he can keep ill, but 
on the number of people who are well. He is judged, as 
all doctors and treatments should be judged, by the vital 
statistics of his district. When the death rate goes up 
his credit goes down. As every increase in his salary 
depends on the issue of a public debate as to the health 
of the constituency under his charge, he has every in- 
ducement to strive towards the ideal of a clean bill of 
health. He has a safe, dignified, responsible, independ- 
ent position based wholly on the public health; whereas 
the private practitioner has a precarious, shabby-genteel, 
irresponsible, servile position, based wholly on the preva- 
lence of illness. 

It is true, there are grave scandals in the public medi- 
cal service. The public doctor may be also a private 
practitioner eking out his earnings by giving a little time 
to public work for a mean payment. There are cases in 
which the position is one which no successful practitioner 
will accept, and where, therefore, incapables or drunk- 
ards get automatically selected for the post, faute de 
mieux; but even in these cases the doctor is less disas- 
trous in his public capacity than in his private one: be- 
sides, the conditions which produce these bad cases are 
doomed, as the evil is now recognized and understood. A 
popular but unstable remedy is to enable local authori- 



Preface on Doctors Ixxvii 

ties, when they are too small to require the undivided 
time of such men as the Medical Officers of our great 
municipalities, to combine for public health purposes so 
that each may share the services of a highly paid official 
of the best class; but the right remedy is a larger area 
as the sanitary unit. 

Medical Organization 

Another advantage of public medical work is that it 
admits of organization, and consequently of the distribu- 
tion of the work in such a manner as to avoid wasting the 
time of highly qualified experts on trivial jobs. The in- 
dividualism of private practice leads to an appalling 
waste of time on trifles. Men whose dexterity as opera- 
tors or almost divinatory skill in diagnosis are constantly 
needed for difficult cases, are poulticing whitlows, vacci- 
nating, changing unimportant dressings, prescribing 
ether drams for ladies with timid leanings towards dip- 
somania, and generally wasting their time in the pursuit 
of private fees. In no other profession is the practitioner 
expected to do all the work involved in it from the first 
day of his professional career to the last as the doctor is. 
The judge passes sentence of death; but he is not ex- 
pected to hang the criminal with his own hands, as he 
would be if the legal profession were as unorganized as 
the medical. The bishop is not expected to blow the 
organ or wash the baby he baptizes. The general is not 
asked to plan a campaign or conduct a battle at half-past 
twelve and to play the drum at half -past two. Even if 
they were, things would still not be as bad as in the 
medical profession; for in it not only is the first-class 
man set to do third-class work, but, what is much more 
terrifying, the third-class man is expected to do first- 
class work. Every general practitioner is supposed to 
be capable of the whole range of medical and surgical 



Ixxviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

work at a moment's notice; and the country doctor, who 
has not a specialist nor a crack consultant at the end of 
his telephone, often has to tackle without hesitation cases 
which no sane practitioner in a town would take in hand 
without assistance. No doubt this develops the resource- 
fulness of the country doctor, and makes him a more ca- 
pable man than his suburban colleague ; but it cannot de- 
velop the second-class man into a first-class one. If the 
practice of law not only led to a judge having to hang, 
but the hangman to judge, or if in the army matters were 
so arranged that it would be possible for the drummer 
boy to be in command at Waterloo whilst the Duke of 
Wellington was playing the drum in Brussels, we should 
not be consoled by the reflection that our hangmen were 
thereby made a little more judicial-minded, and our 
drummers more responsible, than in foreign countries 
where the legal and military professions recognized the 
advantages of division of labor. 

Under such conditions no statistics as to the graduation 
of professional ability among doctors are available. As- 
suming that doctors are normal men and not magicians 
(and it is unfortunately very hard to persuade people to 
admit so much and thereby destroy the romance of doc- 
toring) we may guess that the medical profession, like 
the other professions, consists of a small percentage of 
highly gifted persons at one end, and a small percentage 
of altogether disastrous dulfers at the other. Between 
these extremes comes the main body of doctors (also, of 
course, with a weak and a strong end) who can be trusted 
to work under regulations with more or less aid from 
above according to the gravity of the case. Or, to put it 
in terms of the cases, there are cases that present no 
difficulties, and can be dealt with by a nurse or student 
at one end of the scale, and cases that require watching 
and handling by the very highest existing skill at the 
other ; whilst between come the great mass of cases which 



Preface on Doctors Ixxix 

need visits from the doctor of ordinary ability and from 
the chiefs of the profession in the proportion of, say, 
seven to none, seven to one, three to one, one to one, or, 
for a day or two, none to one. Such a service is organ- 
ized at present only in hospitals; though in large towns 
the practice of calling in the consultant acts, to some ex- 
tent, as a substitute for it. But in the latter case it is 
quite unregulated except by professional etiquet, which, 
as we have seen, has for its object, not the health of the 
patient or of the community at large, but the protection 
of the doctor's livelihood and the concealment of his 
errors. And as the consultant is an expensive luxury, he 
is a last resource rather, as he should be, than a matter of 
course, in all cases where the general practitioner is not 
equal to the occasion: a predicament in which a very 
capable man may find himself at any time through the 
cropping up of a case of which he has had no clinical 
experience. 

The Social Solution of the Medical 

Problem 

The social solution of the medical problem, then, de- 
pends on that large, slowly advancing, pettishly resisted 
integration of society called generally Socialism. Until 
the medical profession becomes a body of men trained 
and paid by the country to keep the country in health it 
will remain what it is at present: a conspiracy to exploit 
popular credulity and human suffering. Already our 
M.O.H.s (Medical Officers of Health) are in the new 
position : what is lacking is appreciation of the change, 
not only by the public but by the private doctors. For, 
as we have seen, when one of the first-rate posts becomes 
vacant in one of the great cities, and all the leading 
M.O.H.s compete for it, they must appeal to the good 
health of the cities of which they have been in charge. 



Ixxx The Doctor's Dilemma 

and not to the size of the incomes the local private doc- 
tors are making out of the ill-health of their patients. If 
a competitor can prove that he has utterly ruined every 
sort of medical private practice in a large city except 
obstetric practice and the surgery of accidents, his claims 
are irresistible; and this is the ideal at which every 
M.O.H. should aim. But the profession at large should 
none the less welcome him and set its house in order for 
the social change which will finally be its own salvation. 
For the M.O.H. as we know him is only the beginning 
of that army of Public Hygiene which will presently take 
the place in general interest and honor now occupied by 
our military and naval forces. It is silly that an Eng- 
lishman should be more afraid of a German soldier than 
of a British disease germ, and should clamor for more 
barracks in the same newspapers that protest against 
more school clinics, and cry out that if the State fights 
disease for us it makes us paupers, though they never 
say that if the State fights the Germans for us it makes 
us cowards. Fortunately, when a habit of thought is silly 
it only needs steady treatment by ridicule from sensible 
and witty people to be put out of countenance and per- 
ish. Every year sees an increase in the number of per- 
sons employed in the Public Health Service, who would 
formerly have been mere adventurers in the Private Ill- 
ness Service. To put it another way, a host of men and 
women who have now a strong incentive to be mischiev- 
ous and even murderous rogues will have a much strong- 
er, because a much honester, incentive to be not only good 
citizens but active benefactors to the community. And 
they will have no anxiety whatever about their incomes. 

The Future of Private Practice 

It must not be hastily concluded that this involves the 
extinction of the private practitioner. What it will really 



Preface on Doctors Ixxxi 

mean for him is release from his present degrading and 
scientifically corrupting slavery to his patients. As I 
have already shewn, the doctor who has to live by pleas- 
ing his patients in competition with everybody who has 
walked the hospitals, scraped through the examinations, 
and bought a brass plate, soon finds himself prescribing 
water to teetotallers and brandy or champagne jelly to 
drunkards ; beefsteaks and stout in one house, and " uric 
acid free" vegetarian diet over the way; shut windows, 
big fires, and heavy overcoats to old Colonels, and open 
air and as much nakedness as is compatible with decency 
to young faddists, never once daring to say either " I 
dont know," or " I dont agree." For the strength of the 
doctor's, as of every other man's position when the evo- 
lution of social organization at last reaches his profession, 
will be that he will always have open to him the alterna- 
tive of public employment when the private employer be- 
comes too tyrannous. And let no one suppose that the 
words doctor and patient can disguise from the parties 
the fact that they are employer and employee. No doubt 
doctors who are in great demand can be as high-handed 
and independent as employees are in all classes when a 
dearth in their labor market makes them indispensable; 
but the average doctor is not in this position : he is strug- 
gling for life in an overcrowded profession, and knows 
well that " a good bedside manner " will carry him to 
solvency through a morass of illness, whilst the least at- 
tempt at plain dealing with people who are eating too 
much, or drinking too much, or frowsting too much (to 
go no further in the list of intemperances that make up 
so much of family life) would soon land him in the Bank- 
ruptcy Court. 

Private practice, thus protected, would itself protect 
individuals, as far as such protection is possible, against 
the errors and superstitions of State medicine, which are 
at worst no worse than the errors and superstitions of 



Ixxxii The Doctor's Dilemma 

private practice, being, indeed, all derived from it. Such 
monstrosities as vaccination are, as we have seen, found- 
ed, not on science, but on half-crowns. If the Vaccina- 
tion Acts, instead of being wholly repealed as they are 
already half repealed, were strengthened by compelling 
every parent to have his child vaccinated by a public offi- 
cer whose salary was completely independent of the num- 
ber of vaccinations performed by him, and for whom 
there was plenty of alternative public health work wait- 
ing, vaccination would be dead in two years, as the vacci- 
nator would not only not gain by it, but would lose credit 
through the depressing effects on the vital statistics of 
his district of the illness and deaths it causes, whilst it 
would take from him all the credit of that freedom from 
smallpox which is the result of good sanitary administra- 
tion and vigilant prevention of infection. Such absurd 
panic scandals as that of the last London epidemic, where 
a fee of half-a-crown per re-vaccination produced raids 
on houses during the absence of parents, and the forcible 
seizure and re-vaccination of children left to answer the 
door, can be prevented simply by abolishing the half- 
crown and all similar follies, paying, not for this or that 
ceremony of witchcraft, but for immunity from disease, 
and paying, too, in a rational way. The officer with a 
fixed salary saves himself trouble by doing his business 
with the least possible interference with the private citi- 
zen. The man paid by the job loses money by not forc- 
ing his job on the public as often as possible without ref- 
erence to its results. 

The Technical Problem 

As to any technical medical problem specially involved, 
there is none. If there were, I should not be competent 
to deal with it, as I am not a technical expert in medicine : 
I deal with the subject as an economist, a politician, and 



Preface on Doctors Ixxxiii 

a citizen exercising my common sense. Everything that 
I have said applies equally to all the medical techniques, 
and will hold good whether public hygiene be based on 
the poetic fancies of Christian Science, the tribal super- 
stitions of the druggist and the vivisector, or the best we 
can make of our real knowledge. But I may remind 
those who confusedly imagine that the medical problem 
is also the scientific problem, that all problems are finally 
scientific problems. The notion that therapeutics or 
hygiene or surgery is any more or less scientific than 
making or cleaning boots is entertained only by people 
to whom a man of science is still a magician who can cure 
diseases, transmute metals, and enable us to live for ever. 
It may still be necessary for some time to come to prac- 
tise on popular credulity, popular love and dread of the 
marvellous, and popular idolatry, to induce the poor to 
comply with the sanitary regulations they are too igno- 
rant to understand. As I have elsewhere confessed, I 
have myself been responsible for ridiculous incantations 
with burning sulphur, experimentally proved to be quite 
useless, because poor people are convinced, by the mysti- 
cal air of the burning and the horrible smell, that it exor- 
cises the demons of smallpox and scarlet fever and 
makes it safe for them to return to their houses. To as- 
sure them that the real secret is sunshine and soap is only 
to convince them that you do not care whether they live 
or die, and wish to save money at their expense. So you 
perform the incantation; and back they go to their 
houses, satisfied. A religious ceremony — a poetic bless- 
ing of the threshold, for instance — would be much better ; 
but unfortunately our religion is weak on the sanitary 
side. One of the worst misfortunes of Christendom was 
that reaction against the voluptuous bathing of the im- 
perial Romans which made dirty habits a part of Chris- 
tian piety, and in some unlucky places (the Sandwich 
Islands for example) made the introduction of Christian- 



Ixxxiv The Doctor's Dilemma 

ity also the introduction of disease, because the formula- 
tors of the superseded native religion, like Mahomet, had 
been enlightened enough to introduce as religious duties 
such sanitary measures as ablution and the most careful 
and reverent treatment of everything cast off by the hu- 
man body, even to nail clippings and hairs ; and our mis- 
sionaries thoughtlessly discredited this godly doctrine 
without supplying its place, which was promptly taken 
by laziness and neglect. If the priests of Ireland could 
only be persuaded to teach their flocks that it is a deadly 
insult to the Blessed Virgin to place her image in a cot- 
tage that is not kept up to that high standard of Sunday 
cleanliness to which all her worshippers must believe she 
is accustomed, and to represent her as being especially 
particular about stables because her son was born in one, 
they might do more in one year than all the Sanitary In- 
spectors in Ireland could do in twenty; and they could 
hardly doubt that Our Lady would be delighted. Per- 
haps they do nowadays; for Ireland is certainly a trans- 
figured country since my youth as far as clean faces and 
pinafores can transfigure it. In England, where so many 
of the inhabitants are too gross to believe in poetic faiths, 
too respectable to tolerate the notion that the stable at 
Bethany was a common peasant farmer's stable instead 
of a first-rate racing one, and too savage to believe that 
anything can really cast out the devil of disease unless it 
be some terrifying hoodoo of tortures and stinks, the 
M.O.H. will no doubt for a long time to come have to 
preach to fools according to their folly, promising mira- 
cles, and threatening hideous personal consequences of 
neglect of by-laws and the like; therefore it will be im- 
portant that every M.O.H. shall have, with his (or her) 
other qualifications, a sense of humor, lest (he or she) 
should come at last to believe all the nonsense that must 
needs be talked. But he must, in his capacity of an ex- 
pert advising the authorities, keep the government itself 



Preface on Doctors Ixxxv 

free of superstition. If Italian peasants are so ignorant 
that the Church can get no hold of them except by mira- 
cles, why, miracles there must be. The blood of St. 
Januarius must liquefy whether the Saint is in the humor 
or not. To trick a heathen into being a dutiful Christian 
is no worse than to trick a whitewasher into trusting him- 
self in a room where a smallpox patient has lain, by pre- 
tending to exorcise the disease with burning sulphur. 
But woe to the Church if in deceiving the peasant it also 
deceives itself; for then the Church is lost, and the peas- 
ant too, unless he revolt against it. Unless the Church 
works the pretended miracle painfully against the grain, 
and is continually urged by its dislike of the imposture 
to strive to make the peasant susceptible to the true rea- 
sons for behaving well, the Church will become an in- 
strument of his corruption and an exploiter of his igno- 
rance, and will find itself launched upon that persecution 
of scientific truth of which all priesthoods are accused — 
and none with more justice than the scientific priesthood. 
And here we come to the danger that terrifies so many 
of us : the danger of having a hygienic orthodoxy imposed 
on us. But we must face that: in such crowded and pov- 
erty ridden civilizations as ours any orthodoxy is better 
than laisser-faire. If our population ever comes to con- 
sist exclusively of well-to-do, highly cultivated, and thor- 
oughly instructed free persons in a position to take care 
of themselves, no doubt they will make short work of a 
good deal of official regulation that is now of life-and- 
death necessity to us ; but under existing circumstances, 
I repeat, almost any sort of attention that democracy will 
stand is better than neglect. Attention and activity lead 
to mistakes as well as to successes ; but a life spent in 
making mistakes is not only more honorable but more 
useful than a life spent doing nothing. The one lesson 
that comes out of all our theorizing and experimenting is 
that there is only one really scientific progressive method ; 



Ixxxvi The Doctor's Dilemma 

and that is the method of trial and error. If you come 
to that, what is laisser-faire but an orthodoxy? the most 
tyrannous and disastrous of all the orthodoxies, since it 
forbids you even to learn. 

The Latest Theories 

Medical theories are so much a matter of fashion, and 
the most fertile of them are modified so rapidly by medi- 
cal practice and biological research, which are interna- 
tional activities, that the play which furnishes the pre- 
text for this preface is already slightly outmoded, though 
I believe it may be taken as a faithful record for the 
year (1906) in which it was begun. I must not expose 
any professional man to ruin by connecting his name 
with the entire freedom of criticism which I, as a layman, 
enjoy; but it will be evident to all experts that my play 
could not have been written but for the work done by Sir 
Almroth Wright in the theory and practice of securing 
immunization from bacterial diseases by the inoculation 
of " vaccines " made of their own bacteria : a practice in- 
correctly called vaccinetherapy (there is nothing vaccine 
about it) apparently because it is what vaccination ought 
to be and is not. Until Sir Almroth Wright, following 
up one of Metchnikoff's most suggestive biological ro- 
mances, discovered that the white corpuscles or phago- 
cytes which attack and devour disease germs for us do 
their work only when we butter the disease germs appe- 
tizingly for them with a natural sauce which Sir Almroth 
named opsonin, and that our production of this condiment 
continually rises and falls rhythmically from negligibil- 
ity to the highest efficiency, nobody had been able even 
to conjecture why the various serums that were from 
time to time introduced as having effected marvellous 
cures, presently made such direful havoc of some unfor- 
tunate patient that they had to be dropped hastily. The 



Preface on Doctors Ixxxvii 

quantity of sturdy lying that was necessary to save the 
credit of inoculation in those days was prodigious ; and 
had it not been for the devotion shewn by the military 
authorities throughout Europe, who would order the en- 
tire disappearance of some disease from their armies, and 
bring it about by the simple plan of changing the name 
under which the cases were reported, or for our own 
Metropolitan Asylums Board, which carefully suppressed 
all the medical reports that revealed the sometimes quite 
appalling effects of epidemics of revaccination, there is 
no saying what popular reaction might not have taken 
place against the whole immunization movement in thera- 
peutics. 

The situation was saved when Sir Almroth Wright 
pointed out that if you inoculated a patient with patho- 
genic germs at a moment when his powers of cooking 
them for consumption by the phagocytes was receding 
to its lowest point, you would certainly make him a good 
deal worse and perhaps kill him, whereas if you made 
precisely the same inoculation when the cooking power 
was rising to one of its periodical climaxes, you would 
stimulate it to still further exertions and produce just 
the opposite result. And he invented a technique for 
ascertaining in which phase the patient happened to be 
at any given moment. The dramatic possibilities of this 
discovery and invention will be found in my play. But 
it is one thing to invent a technique: it is quite another 
to persuade the medical profession to acquire it. Our 
general practitioners, I gather, simply declined to ac- 
quire it, being mostly unable to afford either the acquisi- 
tion or the practice of it when acquired. Something 
simple, cheap, and ready at all times for all comers, is, 
as I have shewn, the only thing that is economically pos- 
sible in general practice, whatever may be the case in 
Sir Almroth's famous laboratory in St. Mary's Hos- 
pital. It would have become necessary to denounce 



Ixxxviii The Doctor's Dilemma 

opsonin in the trade papers as a fad and Sir Almroth as 
a dangerous man if his practice in the laboratory had not 
led him to the conclusion that the customary inoculations 
were very much too powerful, and that a comparatively 
infinitesimal dose would not precipitate a negative phase 
of cooking activity, and might induce a positive one. 
And thus it happens that the refusal of our general 
practitioners to acquire the new technique is no longer 
quite so dangerous in practice as it was when The Doc- 
tor's Dilemma was written: nay, that Sir Ralph Bloom- 
field Bonington's way of administering inoculations as if 
they were spoonfuls of squills may sometimes work 
fairly well. For all that, I find Sir Almroth Wright, on 
the 23rd May, 1910, warning the Royal Society of Medi- 
cine that "the clinician has not yet been prevailed upon 
to reconsider his positon," which means that the general 
practitioner (" the doctor," as he is called in our homes) 
is going on just as he did before, and could not afford to 
learn or practice a new technique even if he had ever 
hea^'d of it. To the patient who does not know about it 
he will say nothing. To the patient who does, he will 
ridicule it, and disparage Sir Almroth. What else can he 
do, except confess his ignorance and starve? 

But now please observe how " the whirligig of time 
brings its revenges." This latest discovery of the reme- 
dial virtue of a very, very tiny hair of the dog that bit 
you reminds us, not only of Arndt's law of protoplasmic 
reaction to stimuli, according to which weak and strong 
stimuli provoke opposite reactions, but of Hahnemann's 
homeopathy, which was founded on the fact alleged by 
Hahnemann that drugs which produce certain symptoms 
when taken in ordinary perceptible quantities, will, when 
taken in infinitesimally small quantities, provoke just 
the opposite symptoms; so that the drug that gives you 
a headache will also cure a headache if you take little 
enough of it. I have already explained that the savage 



Preface on Doctors Ixxxix 

opposition which homeopathy encountered from the med- 
ical profession was not a scientific opposition ; for nobody 
seems to deny that some drugs act in the alleged manner. 
It was opposed simply because doctors and apothecaries 
lived by selling bottles and boxes of doctor's stuff to be 
taken in spoonfuls or in pellets as large as peas ; and peo- 
ple would not pay as much for drops and globules no 
bigger than pins' heads. Nowadays, however, the more 
cultivated folk are beginning to be so suspicious of drugs, 
and the incorrigibly superstitious people so profusely 
supplied with patent medicines (the medical advice to 
take them being wrapped round the bottle and thrown in 
for nothing) that homeopathy has become a way of re- 
habilitating the trade of prescription compounding, and 
is consequently coming into professional credit. At 
which point the theory of opsonins comes very oppor- 
tunely to shake hands with it. 

Add to the newly triumphant homeopathist and the 
opsonist that other remarkable innovator, the Swedish 
masseur, who does not theorize about you, but probes yoJ* 
all over with his powerful thumbs until he finds out your 
sore spots and rubs them away, besides cheating you into 
a little wholesome exercise; and you have nearly every- 
thing in medical practice to-day that is not flat witchcraft 
or pure commercial exploitation of human credulity and 
fear of death. Add to them a good deal of vegetarian 
and teetotal controversy raging round a clamor for scien- 
tific eating and drinking, and resulting in little so far 
except calling digestion Metabolism and dividing the 
public between the eminent doctor who tells us that we 
do not eat enough fish, and his equally eminent colleague 
who warns us that a fish diet must end in leprosy, and 
you have all that opposes with any sort of countenance 
the rise of Christian Science with its cathedrals and con- 
gregations and zealots and miracles and cures: all very 
silly, no doubt, but sane and sensible, poetic and hope- 



xc The Doctor's Dilemma 

ful, compared to the pseudo science of the commercial 
general practitioner, who foolishly clamors for the prose- 
cution and even the execution of the Christian Scientists 
when their patients die, forgetting the long death roll of 
his own patients. 

By the time this preface is in print the kaleidoscope 
may have had another shake ; and opsonin may have gone 
the way of phlogiston at the hands of its own restless 
discoverer. I will not say that Hahnemann may have 
gone the way of Diafoirus ; for Diafoirus we have always 
with us. But we shall still pick up all our knowledge in 
pursuit of some Will o' the Wisp or other. What is 
called science has always pursued the Elixir of Life and 
the Philosopher's Stone, and is just as busy after them 
to-day as ever it was in the days of Paracelsus. We call 
them by different names: Immunization or Radiology or 
what not; but the dreams which lure us into the adven- 
tures from which we learn are always at bottom the same. 
Science becomes dangerous only when it imagines that it 
has reached its goal. What is wrong with i^riests and 
popes is that instead of being apostles and saints, they 
are nothing but empirics who say " I know " instead of 
" I am learning," and pray for credulity and inertia as 
wise men pray for scepticism and activity. Such abomi- 
nations as the Inquisition and the Vaccination Acts are 
possible only in the famine years of the soul, when the 
great vital dogmas of honor, liberty, courage, the kinship 
of all life, faith that the unknown is greater than the 
known and is only the As Yet Unknown, and resolution 
to find a manly highway to it, have been forgotten in a 
paroxysm of littleness and terror in which nothing is ac- 
tive except concupiscence and the fear of death, playing 
on which any trader can filch a fortune, any blackguard 
gratify his cruelty, and any tyrant make us his slaves. 

Lest this should seem too rhetorical a conclusion for 
our professional men of science, who are mostly trained 



Preface on Doctors xci 

not to believe anything unless it is worded in the jargon 
of those writers who, because they never really under- 
stand what they are trying to say, cannot find familiar 
words for it, and are therefore compelled to invent a new 
language of nonsense for every book they write, let me 
sum up my conclusions as dryly as is consistent with ac- 
curate thought and live conviction. 

1. Nothing is more dangerous than a poor doctor: not 
even a poor employer or a poor landlord. 

2. Of all the anti-social vested interests the worst is 
the vested interest in ill-health. 

3. Remember that an illness is a misdemeanor; and 
treat the doctor as an accessory unless he notifies every 
case to the Public Health authority. 

4. Treat every death as a possible and under our pres- 
ent system a probable murder, by making it the subject 
of a reasonably conducted inquest; and execute the doc- 
tor, if necessary, as a doctor, by striking him off the reg- 
ister. 

5. Make up your mind how many doctors the com- 
munity needs to keep it Avell. Do not register more or 
less than this number ; and let registration constitute the 
doctor a civil servant with a dignified living wage paid 
out of public funds. 

6. Municipalize Harley Street. 

7. Treat the private operator exactly as you would 
treat a private executioner. 

8. Treat persons who profess to be able to cure disease 
as you treat fortune tellers. 

9- Keep the public carefully informed, by special sta- 
tistics and announcements of individual cases, of all ill- 
nesses of doctors or in their families. 

10. Make it compulsory for a doctor using a brass 
plate to have inscribed on it, in addition to the letters in- 
dicating his qualifications, the words " Remember that I 
too am mortal." 



xcii The Doctor's Dilemma 

11. In legislation and social organization, proceed on 
the principle that invalids, meaning persons who cannot 
keep themselves alive by their own activities, cannot, be- 
yond reason, expect to be kept alive by the activity of 
others. There is a point at which the most energetic 
policeman or doctor, when called upon to deal with an 
apparently drowned person, gives up artificial respira- 
tion, although it is never possible to declare with cer- 
tainty, at any point short of decomposition, that another 
five minutes of the exercise would not effect resuscitation. 
The theory that every individual alive is of infinite value 
is legislatively impracticable. No doubt the higher the 
life we secure to the individual by wise social organiza- 
tion, the greater his value is to the community, and the 
more pains we shall take to pull him through any tempo- 
rary danger or disablement. But the man who costs more 
than he is worth is doomed by sound hygiene as inexor- 
ably as by sound economics, 

12. Do not try to live for ever. You will not succeed. 

13. Use your health, even to the point of wearing it 
out. That is what it is for. Spend all you have before 
you die; and do not outlive yourself. 

14. Take the utmost care to get well born and well 
brought up. This means that your mother must have a 
good doctor. Be careful to go to a school where there is 
what they call a school clinic, where your nutrition and 
teeth and eyesight and other matters of importance to 
you will be attended to. Be particularly careful to have 
all this done at the expense of the nation, as otherwise it 
will not be done at all, the chances being about forty to 
one against your being able to pay for it directly your- 
self, even if you know how to set about it. Otherwise 
you will be what most people are at present : an unsound 
citizen of an unsound nation, without sense enough to be 
ashamed or unhappy about it. 



THE DOCTOR'S DILEMMA 
XVI 

1906 



I am grateful to Hesba Stretton, the authoress 
of "Jessica's First Prayer," for permission to 
use the title of one of her stories for this play. 



ACT I 

On the 15th June 1903, in the early forenoon, a medi- 
cal student, surname Redpenny , Christian name unknown 
and of no importance, sits at work in a doctor's consult- 
ing-room. He devils for the doctor by answering his let- 
ters, acting as his domestic laboratory assistant, and 
making himself indispensable generally , in return for un- 
specified advantages involved by intimate intercourse 
with a leader of his profession, and amounting to an in- 
formal apprenticeship and a temporary affiliation. Red- 
penny is not proud, and will do anything he is asked 
without reservation of his personal dignity if he is asked 
in a fellow-creaturely way. He is a wide-open-eyed, 
ready, credulous, friendly, hasty youth, with his hair and 
clothes in reluctant transition from the untidy boy to the 
tidy doctor. 

Redpenny is interrupted by the entrance of an old 
serving-woman who has never known the cares, the pre- 
occupations, the responsibilities, jealousies, and anxieties 
of personal beauty. She has the complexion of a never- 
washed gypsy, incurable by any detergent; and she has, 
not a regular beard and moustaches, which could at least 
be trimmed and waxed into a masculine presentableness, 
but a whole crop of small beards and moustaches, mostly 
springing from moles all over her face. She carries a 

3 



4 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

duster and toddles about meddlesomely , spying out dust 
so diligently that whilst she is flicking off one speck she 
is already looking elsewhere for another. In conversa^ 
tion she has the same trick, hardly ever looking at the 
person she is addressing except when she is excited. She 
has only one manner, and that is the manner of an old 
family nurse to a child just after it has learnt to walk. 
She has used her ugliness to secure indulgences unattain- 
able by Cleopatra or Fair Rosamund, and has the further 
great advantage over them that age increases her quali- 
fication instead of impairing it. Being an industrious, 
agreeable, and popular old soul, she is a walking sermon 
on the vanity of feminine prettiness. Just as Redpenny 
has no discovered Christian name, she has no discovered 
surname, and is known throughout the doctors' quarter 
between Cavendish Square and the Marylebone Road 
simply as Emmy. 

The consulting-room has two windows looking on 
Queen Anne Street. Bettveen the two is a marble-topped 
console, with haunched gilt legs ending in sphinx claws. 
The huge pier-glass which surmounts it is mostly dis- 
abled from reflection by elaborate painting on its surface 
of palms, ferns, lilies, tulips, and sunflowers. The ad- 
joining wall contains the fireplace, with two arm-chairs 
before it. As we happen to face the corner we see noth- 
ing of the other two walls. On the right of the fireplace, 
or rather on the right of any person facing the fireplace, 
is the door. On its left is the writing-table at which Red- 
penny sits. It is an untidy table with a microscope, sev- 
eral test tubes, and a spirit lamp standing up through its 
— ^ litter of papers. There is a couch in the middle of the 
\; ?\ room, at right angels to the console, and parallel to the 
fireplace. A chair stands between the couch and the win- 
dowed wall. The windows have green Venetian blinds 
and rep curtains; and there is a gasalier; but it is a con- 
vert to electric lighting. The wall paper and carpets are 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 5 

mostly green, coeval with the gasalier and the Venetian 
blinds. The house, in fact, was so well furnished in the 
middle of the XlXth century that it stands unaltered to 
this day and is still quite presentable. 

Emmy [entering and immediately beginning to dust the 
couch] Theres a lady bothering me to see the doctor. 

Redpenny [distracted by the interruption] Well, she 
cant see the doctor. Look here: whats the use of telling 
you that the doctor cant take any new patients, when the 
moment a knock comes to the door, in you bounce to ask 
whether he can see somebody? 

Emmy. Who asked you whether he could see some- 
body .'' 

Redpenny. You did. 

Emmy. I said theres a lady bothering me to see the 
doctor. That isnt asking. Its telling. 

Redpenny. Well, is the lady bothering you any rea- 
son for you to come bothering me when I'm busy? 

Emmy. Have you seen the papers ? 

Redpenny. No. 

Emmy. Not seen the birthday honors ? 

Redpenny [beginning to swear] What the — 

Emmy. Now, now, ducky ! 

Redpenny. What do you suppose I care about the 
birthday honors? Get out of this with your chattering. 
Dr Ridgeon will be down before I have these letters 
ready. Get out. 

Emmy. Dr Ridgeon wont never be down any more, 
young man. 

She detects dust on the console and is down on it im- 
mediately. 

Redpenny [jumping up and following her] What? 

Emmy. He's been made a knight. Mind you dont go 
Dr Ridgeoning him in them letters. Sir Colenso Rid- 
geon is to be his name now. 



6 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

Redpenny. I'm jolly glad. 

Emmy. I never was so taken aback. I always thought 
his great discoveries was fudge (let alone the mess of 
them) with his drops of blood and tubes full of Maltese 
fever and the like. Now he'll have a rare laugh at me. 

Redpenny. Serve you right ! It was like your cheek 
to talk to him about science. [He returns to his table 
and resumes his rvriting], 

Emmy. Oh, I dont think much of science ; and neither 
will you when youve lived as long with it as I have. 
Whats on my mind is answering the door. Old Sir Pat- 
rick Cullen has been here already and left first congratu- 
lations — hadnt time to come up on his way to the hos- 
pital, but was determined to be first — coming back, he 
said. All the rest will be here too: the knocker will be 
going all day. What I'm afraid of is that the doctor'll 
want a footman like all the rest, now that he's Sir Co- 
lenso. Mind: dont you go putting him up to it, ducky; 
for he'll never have any comfort with anybody but me 
to answer the door. I know who to let in and who to 
keep out. And that reminds me of the poor lady. I 
think he ought to see her. She's just the kind that puts 
him in a good temper. [She dusts Redpenny's papers]. 

Redpenny. I tell you he cant see anybody. Do go 
away, Emmy. How can I work with you dusting all 
over me like this? 

Emmy. I'm not hindering you working — if you call 
writing letters working. There goes the bell. [She 
looks out of the windorv]. A doctor's carriage. Thats 
more congratulations. [She is going out when Sir Co- 
lenso Ridgeon enters']. Have you finished your two 
eggs, sonny.'' 

Ridgeon. Yes. 

Emmy. Have you put on your clean vest? 

Ridgeon. Yes. 

Emmy. Thats my ducky diamond! Now keep your- 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 7 

self tidy and dont go messing about and dirtying your 
hands : the people are coming to congratulate you. \^She 
goes out^. 

Sir Colenso Ridgeon is a man of fifty who has never 
shaken off his youth. He has the off-handed manner and 
the little audacities of address which a shy and sensitive 
man acquires in breaking himself in to intercourse with 
all sorts and conditions of men. His face is a good deal 
lined; his movements are slower than, for instance. Red- 
penny's; and his flaxen hair has lost its lustre; but in 
figure and manner he is more the young man than the 
titled physician. Even the lines in his face are those of 
overwork and restless scepticism, perhaps partly of curi- 
osity and appetite, rather than of age. Just at present 
the announcement of his knighthood in the morning pa- 
pers makes him specially self-conscious, and consequently 
specially off-hand with Redpenny . 

Ridgeon. Have you seen the papers? YouU have to 
alter the name in the letters if you havnt. 

Redpenny. Emmy has just told me. I'm awfully 
glad. I — 

Ridgeon. Enough, yoimg man, enough. You will 
soon get accustomed to it. 

Redpenny. They ought to have done it years ago. 

Ridgeon. They would have; only they couldnt stand 
Emmy opening the door, I daresay. 

Emmy [ai the door, announcing^ Dr Shoemaker. [^She 
withdraws^ . 

A middle-aged gentleman, well dressed, comes in with 
a friendly but propitiatory air, not quite sure of his re- 
ception. His combination of soft manners and responsive 
kindliness, with a certain unseizable reserve and a fami- 
liar yet foreign chiselling of feature, reveal the Jew: in 
this instance the handsome gentlemanly Jew, gone a little 
pigeon-breasted and stale after thirty, as handsome 
young Jews often do, but still decidedly good-looking. 



8 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

The Gentleman. Do you remember me? Schutz- 
macher. University College school and Belsize Avenue. 
Loony Schutzmacher, you know. 

RiDGEON. What! Loony! [He shakes hands cor- 
dially]. Why, man, I thought you were dead long ago. 
Sit down. [Schutzmacher sits on the couch: Ridgeon 
on the chair between it and the window]. Where have 
you been these thirty years ? 

ScHUTZMACHER. In general practice, until a few 
months ago. I've retired. 

Ridgeon. Well done. Loony ! I wish 7 could afford 
to retire. Was your practice in London? 

Schutzmacher. No. 

Ridgeon. Fashionable coast practice, I suppose. 

Schutzmacher. How could I afford to buy a fash- 
ionable practice ? I hadnt a rap. I set up in a manufac- 
turing town in the midlands in a little surgery at ten 
shillings a week. 

Ridgeon. And made your fortune? 

Schutzmacher. Well, I'm pretty comfortable. I 
have a place in Hertfordshire besides our flat in town. 
If you ever want a quiet Saturday to Monday, I'll take 
you down in my motor at an hour's notice. 

Ridgeon. Just rolling in money ! I wish you rich 
g.p.'s would teach me how to make some. Whats the 
secret of it? 

Schutzmacher. Oh, in my case the secret was sim- 
ple enough, though I suppose I should have got into 
trouble if it had attracted any notice. And I'm afraid 
you'll think it rather infra dig. 

Ridgeon. Oh, I have an open mind. What was the 
secret ? 

Schutzmacher. Well, the secret was just two 
words. 

Ridgeon. Not Consultation Free, was it? 

Schutzmacher [shocked] No, no. Really! 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 9 

RiDGEON [apologetic] Of course not. I was only 
joking. 

ScHUTZMACHER. My two words were simply Cure 
Guaranteed. 

RiDGEON [admiring] Cure Guaranteed! 

ScHUTZMACHER. Guaranteed. After all, thats what 
everybody wants from a doctor, isn't it? 

RiDGEON. My dear Loony, it was an inspiration. 
Was it on the brass plate? 

ScHUTZMACHER. There was no brass plate. It was 
a shop window: red, you know, with black lettering. 
Doctor Leo Schutzmacher, L.R.C.P.M.R.C.S. Advice 
and medicine sixpence. Cure Guaranteed. 

RiDGEON. And the guarantee proved sound nine times 
out of ten, eh? 

ScHUTZMACHER [rather hurt at so moderate an esti- 
mate] Oh, much oftener than that. You see, most 
people get well all right if they are careful and you 
give them a little sensible advice. And 'the medi- 
cine really did them good. Parrish's Chemical Food: 
phosphates, you know. One tablespoon ful to a twelve- 
ounce bottle of water: nothing better, no matter what 
the case is. 

RiDGEON. Redpenny: make a note of Parrish's Chemi- 
cal Food. 

ScHUTZMACHER. I take it myself, you know, when I 
feel run down. Good-bye. You dont mind my calling, 
do you? Just to congratulate you. 

RiDGEON. Delighted, my dear Loony. Come to lunch 
on Saturday next week. Bring your motor and take me 
down to Hertford. 

ScHUTZMACHER. I will. Wc sliall be delighted. 
Thank you. Good-bye. [He goes out with Ridgeon, 
who returns immediately] . 

Redpenny. Old Paddy Cullen was here before you 
were up, to be the first to congratulate you. 



10 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

RiDGEON. Indeed. Who taught you to speak of Sir 
Patrick Cullen as old Paddy Cullen, you young ruffian? 

Redpenny. You never call him anything else. 

RiDGEON. Not now that I am Sir Colenso. Next 
thing, you fellows will be calling me old Colly Ridgeon. 

Redpenny. We do, at St. Anne's. 

RiDGEON. Yach ! Thats what makes the medical stu- 
dent the most disgusting figure in modern civilization. 
No veneration, no manners — no — 

Emmy [at the door, announcing^ Sir Patrick Cullen. 
[She retires^. 

Sir Patrick Cullen is more than twenty years older 
than Ridgeon, not yet quite at the end of his tether, but 
near it and resigned to it. His name, his plain, down- 
right, sometimes rather arid common sense, his large 
build and stature, the absence of those odd moments of 
ceremonial servility by which an old English doctor some- 
times shews you what the status of the profession was in 
England in his youth, and an occasional turn of speech, 
are Irish; but he has lived all his life in England and is 
thoroughly acclimatized. His manner to Ridgeon, whom 
he likes, is whimsical and fatherly: to others he is a little 
gruff and uninviting, apt to siibstitute more or less ex- 
pressive grunts for articulate speech, and generally in- 
disposed, at his age, to make much social effort. He 
shakes Ridgeon's hand and beams at him cordially and 
jocularly. 

Sir Patrick. Well, young chap. Is your hat too 
small for you, eh? 

Ridgeon. Much too small. I owe it all to you. 

Sir Patrick. Blarney, my boy. Thank you all the 
same. [He sits in one of the arm-chairs near the fire- 
place. Ridgeon sits on the couch^. Ive come to talk to 
you a bit. [To Redpenny] Young man: get out. 

Redpenny. Certainly, Sir Patrick [He collects his 
papers and makes for the door]. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 11 

Sir Patrick. Thank you. Thats a good lad, [Red- 
penny iianishes^. They all put up with me, these young 
chaps, because I'm an old man, a real old man, not like 
you. Youre only beginning to give yourself the airs of 
age. Did you ever see a boy cultivating a moustache.'' 
Well, a middle-aged doctor cultivating a grey head is 
much the same sort of spectacle. 

RiDGEON. Good Lord! yes: I suppose so. And I 
thought that the days of my vanity were past. Tell me; 
at what age does a man leave off being a fool? 

Sir Patrick. Remember the Frenchman who asked 
his grandmother at what age we get free from the temp- 
tations of love. The old woman said she didn't know. 
[Ridgeon laughs']. Well, I make you the same answer. 
But the world's growing very interesting to me now. 
Colly. 

Ridgeon. You keep up your interest in science, do 
you? 

Sir Patrick. Lord ! yes. Modern science is a won- 
derful thing. Look at your great discovery ! Look at 
all the great discoveries ! Where are they leading to ? 
Why, right back to my poor dear old father's ideas and 
discoveries. He's been dead now over forty years. Oh, 
it's very interesting. 

Ridgeon. Well, theres nothing like progress, is there? 

Sir Patrick. Dont misunderstand me, my boy. I'm 
not belittling your discovery. Most discoveries are made 
regularly every fifteen years; and it's fully a hundred 
and fifty since yours was made last. Thats something to 
be proud of. But your discovery's not new. It's only 
inoculation. My father practised inoculation until it was 
made criminal in eighteen-forty. That broke the poor 
old man's heart, Colly : he died of it. And now it turns 
out that my father was right after all. Youve brought 
us back to inoculation. 

Ridgeon. I know nothing about smallpox. My line 



12 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

is tuberculosis and typhoid and plague. But of course 
the principle of all vaccines is the same. 

Sir Patrick. Tuberculosis ? M-m-m-m ! Youve 
found out how to cure consumption, eh? 

RiDGEON. I believe so. 

Sir Patrick. Ah yes. It's very interesting. What 
is it the old cardinal says in Browning's play? " I have 
known four and twenty leaders of revolt." Well, Ive 
known over thirty men that found out how to cure con- 
sumption. Why do people go on dying of it, Colly? 
Devilment, I suppose. There was my father's old friend 
George Boddington of Sutton Coldfield. He discovered 
the open-air cure in eighteen-forty. He was ruined and 
driven out of his practice for only opening the windows ; 
and now we wont let a consumptive patient have as much 
as a roof over his head. Oh, it's very very interesting 
to an old man. 

RiDGEON. You old cynic, you dont believe a bit in 
my discovery. 

Sir Patrick. No, no: I dont go quite so far as that. 
Colly. But still, you remember Jane Marsh? 

RiDGEON. Jane Marsh? No. 

Sir Patrick. You dont! 

RiDGEON. No. 

Sir Patrick. You mean to tell me you dont remem- 
ber the woman with the tuberculosus ulcer on her arm ? 

RiDGEON [enlightened] Oh, your washerwoman's 
daughter. Was her name Jane Marsh? I forgot. 

Sir Patrick. Perhaps youve forgotten also that you 

.undertook to cure her with Koch's tuberculin. 

"^ RiDGEON. And instead of curing her, it rotted her 

arm right off. Yes : I remember. Poor Jane ! However, 

she makes a good living out of that arm now by shewing 

it at medical lectures. 

Sir Patrick. Still, that wasnt quite what you in- 
tended, was it? 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 13 

RiDGEON. I took my chance of it. 

Sir Patrick. Jane did, you mean. 

RiDGEON. Well, it's always the patient who has to 
take the chance when an experiment is necessary. And 
we can find out nothing without experiment. 

Sir Patrick. What did you find out from Jane's 
case? 

RiDGEON. I found out that the inoculation that ought 
to cure sometimes kills. 

Sir Patrick. I could have told you that. Ive tried 
these modern inoculations a bit myself. Ive killed peo- 
ple with them ; and Ive cured people with them ; but I 
gave them up because I never could tell which I was 
going to do. 

RiDGEON [taking a pamphlet from a drawer in the 
writing-table and handing it to him] Read that the 
next time you have an hour to spare; and youll find 
out why. 

Sir Patrick [grumbling and fumbling for his spec- 
tacles'] Oh, bother your pamphlets. Whats the practice 
of it? [Looking at the pamphlet] Opsonin? What the 
devil is opsonin? 

RiDGEON. Opsonin is what you butter the disease 
germs with to make your white blood corpuscles eat them. 
[He sits down again on the couch]. 

Sir Patrick. Thats not new. Ive heard this notion 
that the white corpuscles — what is it that whats his 
name ? — Metchnikoff — calls them ? 

RiDGEON. Phagocytes. 

Sir Patrick. Aye, phagocytes: yes, yes, yes. Well, 
I heard this theory that the phagocytes eat up the dis- 
ease germs years ago: long before you came into fashion. 
Besides, they dont always eat them. 

RiDGEON. They do when you butter them with op- 
sonin. 

Sir Patrick. Gammon. 



14 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

RiDGEON. No: it's not gammon. What it comes to in 
practice is this. The phagocytes wont eat the microbes 
unless the microbes are nicely buttered for them. Well, 
the patient manufactures the butter for himself all right ; 
but my discovery is that the manufacture of that butter, 
vhich I call opsonin, goes on in the system by ups and 
downs — Nature being always rhythmical, you know — 
and that what the inoculation does is to stimulate the ups 
or downs, as the case may be. If we had inoculated Jane 
Marsh when her butter factory was on the up-grade, we 
should have cured her arm. But we got in on the down- 
grade and lost her arm for her. I call the up-grade the 
positive phase and the down-grade the negative phase. 
Everything depends on your inoculating at the right mo- 
ment. Inoculate when the patient is in the negative 
phase and you kill: inoculate when the patient is in the 
positive phase and you cure. 

Sir Patrick. And pray how are you to know whether 
the patient is in the positive or the negative phase? 

RiDGEON. Send a drop of the patient's blood to the 
laboratory at St. Anne's; and in fifteen minutes I'll give 
you his opsonin index in figures. If the figure is one, in- 
oculate and cure: if it's under point eight, inoculate and 
kill. Thats my discovery: the most important that has 
been made since Harvey discovered the circulation of the 
blood. My tuberculosis patients dont die now. 

Sir Patrick. And mine do when my inoculation 
catches them in the negative phase, as you call it. Eh? 

RiDGEON. Precisely. To inject a vaccine into a pa- 
tient without first testing his opsonin is as near murder 
as a respectable practitioner can get. If I wanted to kill 
a man I should kill him that way. 

Emmy [looking in] Will you see a lady that wants 
her husband's lungs cured? 

RiDGEON [impatiently^ No. Havnt I told you I will 
see nobody? [To Sir Patrick] I live in a state of siege 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 15 

ever since it got about that I'm a magician who can cure 
consumption with a drop of serum. [To Emmy] Dont 
come to me again about people who have no appoint- 
ments. I tell you I can see nobody. s. 

Emmy. Well, I'll tell her to wait a bit. vr 

RiDGEON [furious] Youll tell her I cant see her, and 
send her away: do you hear? 

Emmy [unmoved] Well, will a'ou see Mr Cutler Wal- 
pole.'' He dont want a cure: he only wants to congratu- 
late you. 

RiDGEON. Of course. Shew him up. [She turns to 
go]. Stop. [To Sir Patrick] I want two minutes more 
with you between ourselves. [To Emmy] Emmy: ask 
Mr. Walpole to wait just two minutes, while I finish a 
consultation. 

Emmy. Oh, he'll wait all right. He's talking to the 
poor lady. [She goes out]. 

Sir Patrick. Well? what is it? 

RiDGEON. Dont laugh at me. I want your advice. 

Sir Patrick. Professional advice? 

RiDGEON. Yes. Theres something the matter with 
me. I dont know what it is. 

Sir Patrick. Neither do I. I suppose youve been 
sounded. 

RiDGEON. Yes, of course. Theres nothing wrong 
with any of the organs : nothing special, anyhow. But I 
have a curious aching: I dont know where: I cant localize 
it. Sometimes I think it's my heart: sometimes I suspect 
my spine. It doesnt exactly hurt me ; but it unsettles me 
completely. I feel that something is going to happen. 
And there are other symptoms. Scraps of tunes come 
into my head that seem to me very pretty, though theyre 
quite commonplace. 

Sir Patrick. Do you hear voices? 

RiDGEON. No. 

Sir Patrick. I'm glad of that. When my patients 



16 The Doctor's Dilemma Act 1 

tell me that theyve made a greater discovery than Har- 
vey, and that they hear voices, I lock them up. 

RiDGEON. You think I'm mad! Thats just the sus- 
picion that has come across me once or twice. Tell me 
the truth : I can bear it. 

Sir Patrick. Youre sure there are no voices.'' 

RiDGEON. Quite sure 

Sir Patrick. Then it's only foolishness, 

RiDGEON. Have you ever met anything like it before 
in your practice .f" 

Sir Patrick. Oh, yes: often. It's very common be- 
tween the ages of seventeen and twenty-two. It some- 
times comes on again at forty or thereabouts. Youre a 
bachelor, you see. It's not serious — if youre careful. 

RiDGEON. About my food.'' 

Sir Patrick. No: about your behavior. Theres 
nothing wrong with your spine; and theres nothing 
wrong with your heart; but theres something wrong with 
your common sense. Youre not going to die; but you 
may be going to make a fool of yourself. So be 
careful. 

RiDGEON. I see you dont believe in my discovery. 
Well, sometimes I dont believe in it myself. Thank you 
all the same. Shall we have Walpole up? 

Sir Patrick. Oh, have him up. [Ridgeon rings] . 
He's a clever operator, is Walpole, though he's only one 
of your chloroform surgeons. In my early days, you 
made your man drunk ; and the porters and students held 
him down; and you had to set your teeth and finish the 
job fast. Nowadays you work at your ease; and the pain 
doesn't come until afterwards, when youve taken your 
cheque and rolled up your bag and left the house. I tell 
you. Colly, chloroform has done a lot of mischief. It's 
enabled every fool to be a surgeon. 

RiDGEON [to Emmy, who answers the 6eW] Shew Mr 
Walpole up. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 17 

Emmy. He's talking to the lady. 

RiDGEON [exasperated] Did I not tell you — 

Emmy goes out without heeding him. He gives it up, 
with a shrug, and plants himself with his back to the con- 
sole, leaning resignedly against it. 

Sir Patrick. I know your Cutler Walpoles and their 
like. Theyve found out that a man's body's full of bits 
and scraps of old organs he has no mortal use for. 
Thanks to chloroform, you can cut half a dozen of them 
out without leaving him any the worse, except for the 
illness and the guineas it costs him. I knew the Wal- 
poles well fifteen years ago. The father used to snip off 
the ends of people's uvulas for fifty guineas, and paint 
throats with caustic every day for a year at two guineas 
a time. His brother-in-law extirpated tonsils for two 
hxmdred guineas until he took up women's cases at double 
the fees. Cutler himself worked hard at anatomy to find 
something fresh to operate on ; and at last he got hold of 
something he calls the nuciform sac, which he's made 
quite the fashion. People pay him five hundred guineas 
to cut it out. They might as well get their hair cut for 
all the difference it makes; but I suppose they feel im- 
portant after it. You cant go out to dinner now without 
your neighbor bragging to you of sonie useless operation 
or other. 

Emmy [announcing] Mr Cutler Walpole. [She goes 
ouf]. 

Cutler Walpole is an energetic, unhesitating man of 
forty, with a cleanly modelled face, very decisive and 
symmetrical about the shortish, salient, rather pretty 
nose, and the three trimly turned corners made by his 
chin and jaws. In comparison with Ridgeon's delicate 
broken lines, and Sir Patrick's softly rugged aged ones, 
his face looks machine-made and beeswaxed; but his scru- 
tinizing, daring eyes give it life and force. He seems 
never at a loss, never in doubt: one feels that if he made 



18 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

a mistake he would make it thoroughly and firmly. He 
has neat, well-nourished hands, short arms, and is built 
for strength and compactness rather than for height. He 
is smartly dressed with a fancy waistcoat, a richly col- 
ored scarf secured by a handsome ring, ornaments on his 
watch chain, spats on his shoes, and a general air of the 
well-to-do sportsman about him. He goes straight across 
to Ridgeon and shakes hands with him. 

Walpole. My dear Ridgeon, best wishes ! heartiest 
congratulations ! You deserve it. 

Ridgeon. Thank you. 

Walpole. As a man, mind you. You deserve it as a 
man. The opsonin is simple rot, as any capable surgeon 
can tell you; but we're all delighted to see your personal 
qualities officiallj' recognized. Sir Patrick: how are you.'' 
I sent you a paper lately about a little thing I invented: 
a new saw. For shoulder blades. 

Sir Patrick [meditatively] Yes: I got it. It's a 
good saw : a useful, handy instrument. 

Walpole [confidently'] I knew youd see its points. 

Sir Patrick. Yes: I remember that saw sixty-five 
years ago. 

Walpole. What ! 

Sir Patrick. It was called a cabinetmaker's jimmy 
then. 

Walpole. Get out ! Nonsense ! Cabinetmaker be — 

Ridgeon. Never mind him, Walpole. He's jealous. 

Walpole. By the way, I hope I'm not disturbing 
you two in anything private. 

Ridgeon, No no. Sit down. I was only consulting 
him. I'm rather out of sorts. Overwork, I suppose. 

Walpole [swiftly] I know whats the matter with you. 
I can see it in your complexion. I can feel it in the grip 
of your hand. 

Ridgeon. What is it? 

Walpole. Blood-poisoning. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 19 

RiDGEON. Blood-poisoning ! Impossible. 

Walpole. I tell you, blood-poisoning. Ninety-five 
per cent of the human race suffer from chronic blood- 
poisoning, and die of it. It's as simple as A.B.C. Your 
nuciform sac is full of decaying matter — undigested food 
and waste products — rank ptomaines. Now you take my 
advice, Ridgeon. Let me cut it out for you. You'll be 
another man afterwards. 

Sir Patrick. Dont you like him as he is ? 

Walpole. No I dont. I dont like any man who 
hasnt a healthy circulation. I tell you this : in an intelli- 
gently governed country people wouldnt be allowed to go 
about with nuciform sacs, making themselves centres of 
infection. The operation ought to be compulsory: it's 
ten times more important than vaccination. 

Sir Patrick. Have you had your own sac removed, 
may I ask? 

Walpole [triumphantly] I havnt got one. Look at 
me ! Ive no symptoms. I'm as sound as a bell. About 
five per cent of the population havnt got any; and I'm 
one of the five per cent. I'll give you an instance. You 
know Mrs Jack Foljambe: the smart Mrs Foljambe.^ I 
operated at Easter on her sister-in-law, Lady Gorran, 
and found she had the biggest sac I ever saw: it held 
about two ounces. Well, Mrs. Foljambe had the right 
spirit — the genuine hygienic instinct. She couldnt stand 
her sister-in-law being a clean, sound woman, and she 
simply a whited sepulchre. So she insisted on my oper- 
ating on her, too. And by George, sir, she hadnt any sac 
at all. Not a trace ! Not a rudiment ! ! I was so taken 
aback — so interested, that I forgot to take the sponges 
out, and was stitching them up inside her when the nurse 
missed them. Somehow, I'd made sure she'd have an ex- 
ceptionally large one. [He sits down on the couch, 
squaring his shoulders and shooting his hands out of his 
cuffs as he sets his knuckles akimbo^. 



20 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

Emmy [looking in] Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington. 

A long and expectant pause follows this announcement. 
All look to the door; but there is no Sir Ralph. 

RiDGEON [at last] Where is he? 

Emmy [looking back] Drat him, I thought he was 
following me. He's stayed down to talk to that lady. 

RiDGEON [exploding] I told you to tell that lady — 
[Emmy vanishes]. 

Walpole [jumping up again] Oh, by the way, Rid- 
geon, that reminds me. Ive been talking to that poor 
girl. It's her husband ; and she thinks it's a ease of con- 
sumption : the usual wrong diagnosis : these damned gen- 
eral practitioners ought never to be allowed to touch a 
patient except under the orders of a consultant. She's 
been describing his symptoms to me; and the case is as 
plain as a pikestaff: bad blood-poisoning. Now she's 
poor. She cant afford to have him operated on. Well, 
you send him to me: I'll do it for nothing. Theres room 
for him in my nursing home. I'll put him straight, and 
feed him up and make her happy. I like making people 
happy. [He goes to the chair near the window]. 

Emmy [looking in] Here he is. 

Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington wafts himself into 
the room. He is a tall man, with a head like a tall and 
slender egg. He has been in his time a slender man; but 
now, in his sixth decade, his waistcoat has filled out some- 
what. His fair eyebrows arch good-naturedly and un- 
critically. He has a most musical voice; his speech is a 
perpetual anthem; and he never tires of the sound of it. 
He radiates an enormous self-satisfaction, cheering, reas- 
suring, healing by the mere incompatibility of disease or 
anxiety with his welcome presence. Even broken bones, 
it is said, have been known to unite at the sound of his 
voice: he is a born healer, as independent of mere treat- 
ment and skill as any Christian scientist. When he ex- 
pands into oratory or scientific exposition, he is as ener- 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 21 

getic as Walpole; hut it is with a bland, voluminous, at- 
mospheric energy, rvhich envelops its subject and its 
audience, and makes interruption or inattention impossi- 
ble, and imposes veneration and credulity on all but the 
strongest minds. He is knorvn in the medical rvorld as 
B. B.j and the envy roused by his success in practice is 
softened by the conviction that he is, scientifically con- 
sidered, a colossal humbug: the fact being that, though 
he knoTvs just as much {and just as little) as his contem- 
poraries, the qualifications that pass muster in common 
men reveal their weakness when hung on his egregious 
personality. 

B. B. Aha! Sir Colenso. Sir Colenso, eh? Wel- 
come to the order of knighthood. 

RiDGEON [shaki^ig hands] Thank you, B. B. 

B. B. What! Sir Patrick! And how are we to-day? 
a little chilly? a little stiff? but hale and still the clev- 
erest of us all. [Sir Patrick grunts]. What! Walpole! 
the absent-minded beggar: eh? 

Walpole, What does that mean? 

B. B. Have you forgotten the lovely opera singer 
I sent you to have that growth taken off her vocal cords ? 

Walpole [springing to his feet] Great heavens, man, 
you dont mean to say you sent her for a throat opera- 
tion ! 

B, B. [archly] Aha! Ha ha! Aha! [trilling like a 
lark as he shakes his finger at Walpole], You removed 
her unciform sac. Well, well! force of habit! force of 
habit! Never mind, ne-e-e-ver mind. She got back her 
voice after it, and thinks you the greatest surgeon alive; 
and so you are, so you are, so you are. 

Walpole [in a tragic whisper, intensely serious^ 
Blood-poisoning. I see. I see. [He sits down again]. 

Sir Patrick. And how is a certain distinguished 
family getting on under your care. Sir Ralph? 

B. B. Our friend Ridgeon will be gratified to hear 



22 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

that I have tried his opsonin treatment on little Prince 
Henry with complete success. 

RiDGEON [startled and ana-zoM*] But how 

B. B. [continuing] I suspected typhoid: the head 
gardener's boy had it; so I just called at St Anne's one 
day and got a tube of your very excellent serum. You 
were out, unfortunately. 

RiDGEON. I hope they explained to you carefully 

B. B. [waving away the absurd suggestioii] Lord 
bless you, my dear fellow, I didnt need any explanations. 
I'd left my wife in the carriage at the door; and I'd no 
time to be taught my business by your young chaps. I 
know all about it. Ive handled these anti-toxins ever 
since they first came out. 

RiDGEON. But theyre not anti-toxins; and theyre 
dangerous unless you use them at the right time. 

B. B. Of course they are. Everything is dangerous 
unless you take it at the right time. An apple at break- 
fast does you good: an apple at bedtime upsets you for 
a week. There are only two rules for anti-toxins. First, 
dont be afraid of them: second, inject them a quarter of 
an hour before meals, three times a day. 

RiDGEON [appalled] Great heavens, B. B., no, no, no. 

B. B. [sweeping on irresistibly] Yes, yes, yes. Colly. 
The proof of the pudding is in the eating, you know. It 
was an immense success. It acted like magic on the little 
prince. Up went his temperature; off to bed I packed 
him ; and in a week he was all right again, and absolutely 
immune from typhoid for the rest of his life. The fam- 
ily were very nice about it: their gratitude was quite 
touching ; but I said they owed it all to you, Ridgeon ; 
and I am glad to think that your knighthood is the result. 

RiDGEON. I am deeply obliged to you. [Overcome, 
he sits down on the chair near the couch]. 

B. B. Not at all, not at all. Your own merit. Come ! 
come ! come ! dont give way. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 23 

RiDGEON. It's nothing. I was a little giddy just 
now. Overwork, I suppose. 

Walpole. Blood-poisoning. 

B. B. Overwork ! Theres no such thing. I do the 
work of ten men. Am I giddy? No. NO. If youre 
not well, you have a disease. It may be a slight one; but 
it's a disease. And what is a disease? The lodgment in 
the system of a pathogenic germ, and the multiplication 
of that germ. What is the remedy ? A very simple one. 
Find the germ and kill it. 

Sir Patrick. Suppose theres no germ? 

B. B. Impossible, Sir Patrick: there must be a 
germ: else how could the patient be ill? 

Sir Patrick. Can you shew me the germ of over- 
work? 

B. B. No; but why? Why? Because, my dear Sir 
Patrick, though the germ is there, it's invisible. Nature 
has given it no danger signal for us. These germs — 
these bacilli — are translucent bodies, like glass, like 
water. To make them visible you must stain them. Well, 
my dear Paddy, do what you will, some of them wont 
stain. They wont take cochineal: they wont take methy- 
lene blue; they wont take gentian violet: they wont take 
any coloring matter. Consequently, though we know, as 
scientific men, that they exist, we cannot see them. But 
can you disprove their existence? Can you conceive the 
disease existing without them? Can you, for instance, 
shew me a case of diphtheria without the bacillus? 

Sir Patrick. No; but I'll shew you the same bacil- 
lus, without the disease, in your own throat. 

B. B. No, not the same. Sir Patrick. It is an entirely 
different bacillus; only the two are, unfortunately, so 
exactly alike that you cannot see the difference. You 
must understand, my dear Sir Patrick, that every one of 
these interesting little creatures has an imitator. Just as 
men imitate each other, germs imitate each other. There 



24 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

is the genuine diphtheria bacillus discovered by Loeffler; 
and there is the pseudo-bacillus, exactly like it, which you 
could find, as you say, in my own throat. 

Sir Patrick. And how do you tell one from the 
other ? 

B. B. Well, obviously, if the bacillus is the genuine 
Loeffler, you have diphtheria; and if it's the pseudo- 
bacillus, youre quite well. Nothing simpler. Science is 
always simple and always profound. It is only the 
half-truths that are dangerous. Ignorant faddists pick 
up some superficial information about germs; and 
they write to the papers and try to discredit science. 
They dupe and mislead many honest and worthy people. 
But science has a perfect answer to them on every point. 

A little learning is a dangerous thing ; 
Drink deep ; or taste not the Pierian spring. 

I mean no disrespect to your generation. Sir Patrick: 
some of you old stagers did marvels through sheer pro- 
fessional intuition and clinical experience; but when I 
think of the average men of your day, ignorantly bleed- 
ing and cupping and purging, and scattering germs over 
their patients from their clothes and instruments, and 
contrast all that with the scientific certainty and simplic- 
ity of my treatment of the little prince the other day, I 
cant help being proud of my own generation: the men 
who were trained on the germ theory, the veterans of 
the great struggle over Evolution in the seventies. We 
may have our faults ; but at least we are men of science. 
That is why I am taking up your treatment, Ridgeon, 
and pushing it. It's scientific, [//e sits down on the 
chair near the couch^. 

Emmy [at the door, announcing] Dr Blenkinsop. 

Dr Blenkinsop is in very different case from the others. 
He is clearly not a prosperous man. He is flabby and 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 25 

shabby, cheaply fed and cheaply clothed. He has the 
lines made by a conscience between his eyes, and the lines 
made by continual money worries all over his face, cut 
all the deeper as he has seen better days, and hails his 
well-to-do colleagues as their contemporary and old hos- 
pital friend, though even in this he has to struggle with 
the diffidence of poverty and relegation to the poorer 
middle class. 

RiDGEON. How are you, Blenkinsop ? 

Blenkinsop. Ive come to offer my humble congratu- 
lations. Oh dear ! all the great guns are before me. 

B. B. [patronizing, but charming^ How d'ye do, 
Blenkinsop.'' How d'ye do.'' 

Blenkinsop. And Sir Patrick, too ! \^Sir Patrick 
grunts^. 

RiDGEON. Youve met Walpole, of course? 

Walpole. How d'ye do? 

Blenkinsop. It's the first time Ive had that honor. 
In my poor little practice there are no chances of meet- 
ing you great men. I know nobody but the St Anne's 
men of my own day. [To Ridgeon^ And so youre Sir 
Colenso. How does it feel? 

RiDGEON. Foolish at first. Dont take any notice of it. 

Blenkinsop. I'm ashamed to say I havnt a notion 
what your great discovery is; but I congratulate you all 
the same for the sake of old times. 

B. B. [^shocked^ But, my dear Blenkinsop, you used 
to be rather keen on science. 

Blenkinsop. Ah, I used to be a lot of things. I used 
to have two or three decent suits of clothes, and flannels 
to go up the river on Sundays. Look at me now: this is 
my best; and it must last till Christmas. What can I 
do ? Ive never opened a book since I was qualified thirty 
years ago. I used to read the medical papers at first; 
but you know how soon a man drops that; besides, I cant 
afford them ; and what are they after all but trade papers. 



26 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

full of advertisements? Ive forgotten all my science: 
whats the use of my pretending I havnt? But I have 
great experience: clinical experience; and bedside expe- 
rience is the main thing, isn't it? 

B. B. No doubt; always provided, mind you, that 
you have a sound scientific theory to correlate your ob- 
servations at the bedside. Mere experience by itself is 
nothing. If I take my dog to the bedside with me, he 
sees what I see. But he learns nothing from it. Why? 
Because he's not a scientific dog. 

Walpole. It amuses me to hear you physicians and 
general practitioners talking about clinical experience. 
What do you see at the bedside but the outside of the 
patient? Well: it isnt his outside thats wrong, except 
perhaps in skin cases. What you want is a daily famili- 
arity with people's insides; and that you can only get at 
the operating table. I know what I'm talking about: 
Ive been a surgeon and a consultant for twenty years; 
and Ive never known a general practitioner right in his 
diagnosis yet. Bring them a perfectly simple case; and 
they diagnose cancer, and arthritis, and appendicitis, and 
every other itis, when any really experienced surgeon 
can see that it's a plain case of blood-poisoning. 

Blenkinsop. Ah, it's easy for you gentlemen to talk; 
but what would you say if you had my practice ? Except 
for the workmen's clubs, my patients are all clerks and 
shopmen. They darent be ill: they cant afford it. And 
when they break down, what can I do for them? You 
can send your people to St Moritz or to Egypt, or recom- 
mend horse exercise or motoring or champagne jelly or 
complete change and rest for six months. I might as 
well order my people a slice of the moon. And the worst 
of it is, I'm too poor to keep well myself on the cooking 
I have to put up with. Ive such a wretched digestion; 
and I look it. How am I to inspire confidence? \^He 
sits disconsolately on the couch^. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 27 

RiDGEON [^restlessly] Dont, Blenkinsop: it's too 
painful. The most tragic thing in the world is a sick 
doctor. 

Walpole. Yes, by George: its like a bald-headed 
man trying to sell a hair restorer. Thank God I'm a 
surgeon ! 

B. B. [sunnily] I am never sick. Never had a day's 
illness in my life. Thats what enables me to sympathize 
with my patients. 

Walpole [interested] What! youre never ill? 

B. B. Never. 

Walpole. Thats interesting. I believe you have no 
nuciform sac. If you ever do feel at all queer, I should 
very much like to have a look. 

B. B. Thank you, my dear fellow; but I'm too busy 
just now. 

RiDGEON. I was just telling them when you came in, 
Blenkinsop, that I have worked myself out of sorts 

Blenkinsop. Well, it seems presumptuous of me to 
offer a prescription to a great man like you; but still I 
have great experience ; and if I might recommend a 
pound of ripe greengages every day half an hour before 
lunch, I'm sure youd find a benefit. Theyre very cheap. 

RiDGEON. What do you say to that B. B..-^ 

B. B. [encouragingly] Very sensible, Blenkinsop: 
very sensible indeed. I'm delighted to see that you dis- 
approve of drugs. 

Sir Patrick [grunts] ! 

B. B. [archly] Aha! Haha! Did I hear from the 
fireside armchair the bow-wow of the old school defend- 
ing its drugs.'' Ah, believe me, Paddy, the world would 
be healthier if every chemist's shop in England were de- 
molished. Look at the papers ! full of scandalous adver- 
tisements of patent medicines ! a huge commercial system 
of quackery and poison. Well, whose fault is it? Ours. 
I say, ours. We set the example. We spread the super- 



28 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

stition. We taught the people to believe in bottles of 
doctor's stuff; and now they buy it at the stores instead 
of consulting a medical man. 

Walpole. Quite true. Ive not prescribed a drug for 
the last fifteen years. 

B. B. Drugs can only repress symptoms: they can- 
not eradicate disease. The true remedy for all diseases 
is Nature's remedy. Nature and Science are at one, Sir 
Patrick, believe me; though you were taught differently. 
Nature has provided, in the white corpuscles as you call 
them — in the phagocytes as we call them — a natural 
means of devouring and destroying all disease germs. 
There is at bottom only one genuinely scientific treat- 
ment for all diseases, and that is to stimulate the phago- 
cytes. Stimulate the phagocytes. Drugs are a delusion. 
Find the germ of the disease ; prepare from it a suitable 
anti-toxin; inject it three times a day quarter of an hour 
before meals; and what is the result? The phagocytes 
are stimulated; they devour the disease; and the patient 
recovers — unless, of course, he's too far gone. That, I 
take it, is the essence of Ridgeon's discovery. 

Sir Patrick [dreamily] As I sit here, I seem to hear 
my poor old father talking again. 

B, B. [rising in incredulous amazement^ Your father! 
But, Lord bless my soul, Paddy, your father must have 
been an older man than you. 

Sir Patrick. Word for word almost, he said what 
you say. No more drugs. Nothing but inoculation. 

B. B. [almost contemptuously] Inoculation! Do you 
mean smallpox inoculation? 

Sir Patrick. Yes. In the privacy of our family 
circle, sir, my father used to declare his belief that small- 
pox inoculation was good, not only for smallpox, but for 
all fevers. 

B. B. [suddenly rising to the new idea with immense 
interest and excitement] What! Ridgeon: did you hear 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 29 

that? Sir Patrick: I am more struck by what you have 
just told me than I can well express. Your father, sir, 
anticipated a discovery of my own. Listen, Walpole. 
Blenkinsop: attend one moment. You will all be in- 
tensely interested in this. I was put on the track by 
accident. I had a typhoid case and a tetanus case side 
by side in the hospital: a beadle and a city missionary. 
Think of what that meant for them, poor fellows ! Can 
a beadle be dignified with typhoid .'' Can a missionary be 
eloquent with lockjaw.^ No. NO. Well, I got some 
typhoid anti-toxin from Ridgeon and a tube of Mul- 
dooley's anti-tetanus serum. But the missionary jerked 
all my things off the table in one of his paroxysms ; and in 
replacing them I put Ridgeon's tube where Muldooley's 
ought to have been. The consequence was that I inocu- 
lated the typhoid case for tetanus and the tetanus case 
for typhoid. [The doctors look greatly concerned. B. 
B., undamped, smiles triumphantly] . Well, they recov- 
ered. THEY RECOVERED. Except for a touch of St Vi- 
tus 's dance the missionary's as well to-day as ever; and 
the beadle's ten times the man he was. 

Blenkinsop. Ive known things like that happen. 
They cant be explained. 

B. B. [severely] Blenkinsop: there is nothing that 
cannot be explained by science. What did I do ? Did I 
fold my hands helplessly and say that the case could not 
be explained? By no means. I sat down and used my 
brains. I thought the case out on scientific principles. I 
asked myself why didnt the missionary die of typhoid on 
top of tetanus, and the beadle of tetanus on top of 
typhoid? Theres a problem for you, Ridgeon. Think, 
Sir Patrick. Reflect, Blenkinsop. Look at it without 
prejudice, Walpole. What is the real work of the anti- 
toxin? Simply to stimulate the phagocytes. Very well. 
But so long as you stimulate the phagocytes, what does 
it matter which particular sort of serum you use for the 



30 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

purpose? Haha! Eh? Do you see? Do you grasp it? 
Ever since that Ive used all sorts of anti-toxins abso- 
lutely indiscriminately, with perfectly satisfactory re- 
sults. I inoculated the little prince with your stuff, 
Ridgeon, because I wanted to give you a lift; but two 
years ago I tried the experiment of treating a scarlet 
fever case with a sample of hydrophobia serum from the 
Pasteur Institute, and it answered capitally. It stimu- 
lated the phagocytes; and the phagocytes did the rest. 
That is why Sir Patrick's father found that inoculation 
cured all fevers. It stimulated the phagocytes. \^He 
throws himself into his chair, exhausted with the tri- 
umph of his demonstration, and beams magnificently on 
them]. 

Emmy [looking in] Mr Walpole: your motor's come 
for you; and it's frightening 8ir Patrick's horses; so 
come along quick. 

Walpole [rising] Good-bye, Ridgeon. 

RiDGEON. Good-bye; and many thanks. 

B. B. You see my point, Walpole? 

Emmy. He cant wait. Sir Ralph. The carriage will 
be into the area if he dont come. 

Walpole. I'm coming. [To B. B.] Theres nothing 
in your point : phagocytosis is pure rot : the cases are all 
blood-poisoning; and the knife is the real remedy. Bye- 
bye, Sir Paddy. Happy to have met you, Mr. Blenk- 
insop. Now, Emmy. [He goes out, followed by 
Emmy]. 

B. B. [sadly] Walpole has no intellect. A mere 
surgeon. Wonderful operator; but, after all, what is op- 
erating? Only manual labor. Brain — brain remains 
master of the situation. The nuciform sac is utter non- 
sense: theres no such organ. It's a mere accidental kink 
in the membrane, occurring in perhaps two-and-a-half 
per cent of the population. Of course I'm glad for Wal- 
pole's sake that the operation is fashionable; for he's a 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 31 

dear good fellow; and after all, as I always tell people, 
the operation will do them no harm: indeed, Ive known 
the nervous shake-up and the fortnight in bed do people 
a lot of good after a hard London season; but still it's 
a shocking fraud. [Rising] Well, I must be toddling. 
Good-bye, Paddy [Sir Patrick grunts] good-bye, good- 
bye. Good-bye, my dear Blenkinsop, good-bye ! Good- 
bye, Ridgeon. Dont fret about your health: you know 
what to do: if 3'our liver is sluggish, a little mercury 
never does any harm. If you feel restless, try bromide. 
If that doesnt answer, a stimulant, you know: a little 
phosphorus and strychnine. If you cant sleep, trional, 
trional, trion — 

Sir Patrick [drily] But no drugs. Colly, remember 
that. 

B. B. [firmly] Certainly not. Quite right. Sir Pat- 
rick. As temporary expedients, of course; but as treat- 
ment, no, NO. Keep away from the chemist's shop, my 
dear Ridgeon, whatever you do. 

Ridgeon [going to the door with him] I will. And 
thank you for the knighthood. Good-bye. 

B. B. [stopping at the door, with the beam in his eye 
twinkling a little] By the way, who's your patient.'' 

Ridgeon. Who.'' 

B. B. Downstairs. Charming woman. Tuberculous 
husband. 

Ridgeon. Is she there still? 

Emmy [looking in] Come on. Sir Ralph: your wife's 
waiting in the carriage. 

B. B. [suddenly sobered] Oh ! Good-bye. [He goes 
out almost precipitately]. 

Ridgeon. Emmy: is that woman there still? If so, 
tell her once for all that I cant and wont see her. Do 
you hear? 

Emmy. Oh, she aint in a hurry: she doesnt mind how 
long she waits. [She goes out]. 



32 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

Blenkinsop. I must be off, too: every half -hour I 
spend away from my work costs me eighteenpence. 
Good-bye, Sir Patrick, 

Sir Patrick. Good-bye. Good-bye. 

RiDGEON. Come to lunch with me some day this 
week. 

Blenkinsop. I cant afford it, dear boy; and it would 
put me off my own food for a week. Thank you all the 
same. 

RiDGEON {^uneasy at Blenkinsop' s poverty^ Can I do 
nothing for you? 

Blenkinsop. Well, if you have an old frock-coat to 
spare? you see what would be an old one for you would 
be a new one for me; so remember the next time you 
turn out your wardrobe. Good-bye. [i7e hurries 
out^. 

RiDGEON \loohing after l^im^^ Poor chap! [^Turning 
to Sir Patrick] So thats why they made me a knight! 
And thats the medical profession I 

Sir Patrick. And a very good profession, too, my 
lad. When you know as much as I know of the igno- 
rance and superstition of the patients, youU wonder that 
we're half as good as we are. 

RiDGEON. We're not a profession : we're a conspiracy. 

Sir Patrick. All professions are conspiracies against 
the laity. And we cant all be geniuses like you. Every 
fool can get ill; but every fool cant be a good doctor: 
there are not enough good ones to go round. And for all 
you know, Bloomfield Bonington kills less people than 
you do. 

RiDGEON. Oh, very likely. But he really ought to 
know the difference between a vaccine and an anti-toxin. 
Stimulate the phagocytes ! The vaccine doesnt affect the 
phagocytes at all. He's all wrong: hopelessly, danger- 
ously wrong. To put a tube of serum into his hands is 
murder: simple murder. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 33 

Emmy [returjiing] Now, Sir Patrick. How long 
more are you going to keep them horses standing in the 
draught ? 

Sir Patrick. Whats that to you, you old cata- 
maran ? 

Emmy. Come, come, now ! none of your temper to me. 
And it's time for Colly to get to his work. 

RiDGEON. Behave yourself, Emmy. Get out. 

Emmy. Oh, I learnt how to behave myself before I 
learnt you to do it. I know what doctors are: sitting 
talking together about themselves when they ought to be 
with their poor patients. And I know what horses are, 
Sir Patrick. I was brought up in the country. Now be 
good; and come along. 

Sir Patrick [rising] Very well, very well, very well. 
Good-bye, Colly. [He pats Ridgeon on the shoulder and 
goes out, turning for a moment at the door to look medi- 
tatively at Emmy and say, with grave conviction] You 
are an ugly old devil, and no mistake. 

Emmy [highly indignant, calling after hi7n] Youre 
no beauty yourself. [To Ridgeon, much flustered] 
Theyve no manners : they think they can say what they 
like to me; and you set them on, you do. I'll teach them 
their places. Here now: are you going to see that poor 
thing or are you not? 

Ridgeon. I tell you for the fiftieth time I wont see 
anybody. Send her away. 

Emmy. Oh, I'm tired of being told to send her away. 
Wliat good will that do her? 

Ridgeon. Must I get angry with you, Emmy? 

Emmy [coaxing] Come now: just see her for a min- 
ute to please me: theres a good boy. She's given me 
half-a-crown. She thinks it's life and death to her hus- 
band for her to see you. 

Ridgeon. Values her husband's life at half-a-crown ! 

Emmy. Well, it's all she can afford, poor lamb. Them 



34 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

others think nothing of half-a-sovereign just to talk 
about themselves to you, the sluts ! Besides, she'll put 
you in a good temper for the day, because it's a good deed 
to see her; and she's the sort that gets round you. 

RiDGEON. Well, she hasnt done so badly. For half- 
a-crown she's had a consultation with Sir Ralph Bloom- 
field Bonington and Cutler Walpole. Thats six guineas' 
worth to start with. I dare say she's consulted Blenkin- 
sop too: thats another eighteenpence. 

Emmy. Then youll see her for me, wont you? 

RiDGEON. Oh, send her up and be hanged. [Emmy 
trots out, satisfied. Ridgeon calls] Redpenny ! 

Redpenny [appearing at the door] What is it.'' 

RiDGEON. Theres a patient coming up. If she hasnt 
gone in five minutes, come in with an urgent call from the 
hospital for me. You understand: she's to have a strong 
hint to go. 

Redpenny. Right O ! [//e vanishes] . 

Ridgeon goes to the glass, and arranges his tie a little. 

Emmy [announciyig] Mrs Doobidad [Ridgeon leaves 
the glass and goes to the writing-table]. 

The lady comes in. Emmy goes out and shuts the door. 
Ridgeon, who has put on an impenetrable and rather dis- 
tant professional manner, turns to the lady, and invites 
her, by a gesture, to sit down on the couch. 

Mrs Dubedat is beyond all demur an arrestingly good- 
looking young woman. She has something of the grace 
and romance of a wild creature, with a good deal of the 
elegance and dignity of a fine lady. Ridgeon, who is ex- 
tremely susceptible to the beauty of women, instinctively 
assumes the defensive at once, and hardens his manner 
still more. He has an impression that she is very 
well dressed; but she has a figure on which any dress 
would look well, and carries herself with the unaf- 
fected distinction of a woman who has never in her life 
suffered from those doubts and fears as to her social posi- 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 35 

Hon which spoil the manners of most middling people. 
She is tall, slender, and strong; has dark hair, dressed so 
as to look like hair and not like a bird's nest or a panta- 
loon's wig (fashion wavering just then between these two 
models) J has unexpectedly narrow, subtle, dark-fringed 
eyes that alter her expression disturbingly when she is 
excited and flashes them wide open; is softly impetuous 
in her speech and swift in her movements; and is just 
now in mortal anxiety. She carries a portfolio. 

Mrs Dubedat [iii low urgent tones] Doctor — 

RiDGEON [curtly] Wait. Before you begin, let me 
tell you at once that I can do nothing for you. My hands 
are full. I sent you that message by my old servant. 
You would not take that answer. 

Mrs Dubedat. How could I.'' 

RiDGEON. You bribed her. 

Mrs Dubedat. I — 

RiDGEON. That doesnt matter. She coaxed me to see 
you. Well, you must take it from me now that with all 
the good will in the world, I cannot undertake another 
case. 

Mrs Dubedat. Doctor: you must save my husband. 
You must. When I explain to you, you will see that you 
must. It is not an ordinary case, not like any other case. 
He is not like anybody else in the world : oh, believe me, 
he is not. I can prove it to you: [fingering her portfolio] 
I have brought some things to shew you. And you can 
save him : the papers say you can. 

RiDGEON. Whats the matter? Tuberculosis? 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes. His left lung — 

RiDGEON. Yes: you neednt tell me about that. 

Mrs Dubedat. You can cure him, if only you will. 
It is true that you can, isnt it? [In great distress] Oh, 
tell me, please. 

RiDGEON [warningly] You are going to be quiet and 
self-possessed, arnt you? 



36 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes. I beg your pardon. I know I 
shouldnt — [Giving way again] Oh, please, say that you 
can; and then I shall be all right. 

RiDGEON [huffily] I am not a curemonger: if you 
want cures, you must go to the people who sell them. 
[Recovering himself, ashamed of the tone of his own 
voice] But I have at the hospital ten tuberculous pa- 
tients whose lives I believe I can save. 

Mrs Dubedat. Thank God ! 

RiDGEON. Wait a moment. Try to think of those ten 
patients as ten shipwrecked men on a raft — a raft that is 
barely large enough to save them — that will not support 
one more. Another head bobs up through the waves at 
the side. Another man begs to be taken aboard. He im- 
plores the captain of the raft to save him. But the cap- 
tain can only do that by pushing one of his ten off the 
raft and drowning him to make room for the new comer. 
That is what you are asking me to do. 

Mrs Dubedat. But how can that be? I dont under- 
stand. Surely — 

RiDGEON. You must take my word for it that it is so. 
My laboratory, my staff, and myself are working at full 
pressure. We are doing our utmost. The treatment is a 
new one. It takes time, means, and skill ; and there is not 
enough for another case. Our ten cases are already 
chosen cases. Do you understand what I mean by 
chosen ? 

Mrs Dubedat. Chosen. No: I cant understand. 

RiDGEON [sternly] You must understand. Youve 
got to understand and to face it. In every single one of 
those ten cases I have had to consider, not only whether 
the man could be saved, but whether he was worth sav- 
ing. There were fifty cases to choose from; and forty 
had to be condemned to death. Some of the forty had 
young wives and helpless children. If the hardness of 
their cases could have saved them they would have been 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 37 

saved ten times over. Ive no doubt your case is a hard 
one: I can see the tears in your eyes [she hastily wipes 
her eyes] : I know that you have a torrent of entreaties 
ready for me the moment I stop speaking; but it's no 
use. You must go to another doctor. 

Mrs Dubedat. But can you give me the name of an- 
other doctor who understands your secret.'' 

RiDGEON. I have no secret : I am not a quack. 

Mrs Dubedat. I beg your pardon: I didnt mean to 
say anything wrong. I dont understand how to speak 
to you. Oh, pray dont be offended. 

RiDGEON [again a little ashamed] There! there! never 
mind. [He relaxes and sits do?vn]. After all, I'm talk- 
ing nonsense: I daresay I am a quack, a quack with a 
qualification. But my discovery is not patented. 

Mrs Dubedat. Then can any doctor cure my hus- 
band } Oh, why dont they do it ? I have tried so many : 
I have spent so much. If only you would give me the 
name of another doctor. 

RiDGEON. Every man in this street is a doctor. 
But outside myself and the handful of men I am 
training at St Anne's, there is nobody as yet who has 
mastered the opsonin treatment. And we are full up.'' 
I'm sorry; but that is all I can say. [Rising] Good 
morning. 

Mrs Dubedat [suddenly and desperately taking some 
drawings from her portfolio] Doctor: look at these. 
You understand drawings: you have good ones in your 
waiting-room. Look at them. They are his work. 

RiDGEON. It's no use my looking. [He looks, all the 
saine] Hallo! [He takes one to the window and studies 
it]. Yes: this is the real thing. Yes, yes. [He looks at 
another and returns to her]. These are very clever. 
Theyre unfinished, arnt thej^.^ 

Mrs Dubedat. He gets tired so soon. But you see, 
dont you, what a genius he is ? You see that he is worth 



38 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

saving. Oh, doctor, I married him just to help him to 
begin: I had money enough to tide him over the hard 
years at the beginning — to enable him to follow his in- 
spiration until his genius was recognized. And I was 
useful to him as a model: his drawings of me sold quite 
quickly. 

RiDGEON. Have you got one? 

Mrs Dubedat [producing another^ Only this one. 
It was the first. 

RiDGEON [devouring it with his eyes] Thats a won- 
derful drawing. Why is it called Jennifer? 

Mrs Dubedat. My name is Jennifer. 

RiDGEON. A strange name. 

Mrs Dubedat. Not in Cornwall. I am Cornish. 
It's only what you call Guinevere. 

RiDGEON [repeating the names with a certain pleasure 
in them] Guinevere. Jennifer. [Looking again at the 
drawing] Yes: it's really a wonderful drawing. Excuse 
me; but may I ask is it for sale? I'll buy it. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, take it. It's my own : he gave it 
to me. Take it. Take them all. Take everything; 
ask anything; but save him. You can: you will: you 
must. 

Redpenny [entering with every sign of alarm] 
Theyve just telephoned from the hospital that youre to 
come instantly — a patient on the point of death. The 
carriage is waiting. 

RiDGEON [intolerantly] Oh, nonsense: get out. 
[Greatly annoyed] What do you mean by interrupting 
me like this? 

Redpenny. But — 

RiDGEON, Chut! cant you see I'm engaged? Be off. 

Redpenny, bewildered, vanishes. 

Mrs Dubedat [rising] Doctor: one instant only be- 
fore you go — 

RiDGEON. Sit down. It's nothing. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 39 

Mrs Dubedat. But the patient. He said he was 
dying. 

RiDGEON. Oh, he's dead by this time. Never mind. 
Sit down. 

Mrs Dubedat \_sitting down and breaking down^ 
Oh, you none of you care. You see people die every 
day. 

Ridgeon [petting her] Nonsense! it's nothing: I told 
him to come in and say that. I thought I should want to 
get rid of you. 

Mrs Dubedat [shocked at the falsehood] Oh ! 

Ridgeon [continuing] Dont look so bewildered: 
theres nobody dying. 

Mrs Dubedat. My husband is. 

Ridgeon [pulling himself together] Ah, yes : I had 
forgotten your husband. Mrs Dubedat: you are asking 
me to do a very serious thing? 

Mrs Dubedat. I am asking you to save the life of a 
great man. 

Ridgeon, You are asking me to kill another man for 
his sake; for as surely as I undertake another case, I 
shall have to hand back one of the old ones to the ordi- 
nary treatment. Well, I dont shrink from that. I have 
had to do it before; and I will do it again if you can 
convince me that his life is more important than the 
worst life I am now saving. But you must convince me 
first. 

Mrs Dubedat. He made those drawings; and they 
are not the best — nothing like the best; only I did not 
bring the really best: so few people like them. He is 
twenty-three : his whole life is before him. Wont you let 
me bring him to you? wont you speak to him? wont you 
see for yourself? 

Ridgeon. Is he well enough to come to a dinner at 
the Star and Garter at Richmond? 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh yes. Why? 



40 The Doctor's Dilemma Act I 

RiDGEON. I'll tell you. I am inviting all my old 
friends to a dinner to celebrate my knighthood — youve 
seen about it in the papers, havnt you? 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, oh yes. That was how I found 
out about you. 

RiDGEON. It will be a doctors' dinner; and it was to 
have been a bachelors' dinner. I'm a bachelor. Now if 
you will entertain for me, and bring your husband, he 
will meet me; and he will meet some of the most eminent 
men in my profession: Sir Patrick Cullen, Sir Ralph 
Bloorafield Bonington, Cutler Walpole, and others. I 
can put the case to them ; and your husband will have to 
stand or fall by what we think of him. Will you come.'' 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, of course I will come. Oh, 
thank you, thank you. And may I bring some of his 
drawings — the really good ones.'' 

RiDGEON. Yes. I will let you know the date in the 
course of to-morrow. Leave me your address. 

Mrs Dubedat. Thank you again and again. You 
have made me so happy : I know you will admire him and 
like him. This is my address. [She gives him her card], 

RiDGEON. Thank you. [He rings] . 

Mrs Dubedat [embarrassed] May I — is there — 
should I — I mean — [she blushes and stops in confusion] . 

RiDGEON. Whats the matter ? 

Mrs Dubedat. Your fee for this consultation? 

RiDGEON. Oh, I forgot that. Shall we say a beauti- 
ful drawing of his favorite model for the whole treat- 
ment, including the cure? 

Mrs Dubedat. You are very generous. Thank you. 
I know you will cure him. Good-bye. 

RiDGEON. I will. Good-bye. [They shake hands]. 
By the way, you know, dont you, that tuberculosis is 
catching. You take every precaution, I hope. 

Mrs Dubedat. I am not likely to forget it. They 
treat us like lepers at the hotels. 



Act I The Doctor's Dilemma 41 

Emmy [at the door] Well, deary : have you got round 
him? 

RiDGKON, Yes. Attend to the door and hold your 
tongue. 

Emmy. Thats a good boy. [She goes out with Mrs 
Dubedat]. 

RiDGEON [alone] Consultation free. Cure gnaran* 
teed. [He heaves a great sigh^. 



ACT II 

After dinner on the terract at the Star and Garter, 
Richmond. Cloudless summer night; nothing disturbs 
the stillness except from time to time the long trajectory 
of a distant train and the measured clucking of oars com- 
ing up from the Thames in the valley below. The dinner 
is over; and three of the eight chairs are empty. Sir 
Patrick, with his back to the view, is at the head of the 
square table with Ridgeon. The two chairs opposite 
them are empty. On their right come, first, a vacant 
chair, and then one very fully occupied by ]S. B., who 
basks blissfully in the moonbeams. On their left, Schutz- 
macher and Walpole. The entrance to the hotel is on 
their right, behind B. B. The five men are silently en- 
joying their coffee and cigarets, full of food, and not al- 
together void of wine. 

Mrs Dubedat, wrapped up for departure, comes in. 
They rise, except Sir Patrick; but she takes one of the 
vacant places at the foot of the table, next B. B.; and 
they sit down again. 

Mrs Dubedat [as she enters] Louis will be here pres- 
ently. He is shewing Dr Blenkinsop how to work the 
telephone. [She sits.] Oh, I am so sorry we have to go. 
It seems such a shame, this beautiful night. And we 
have enjoyed ourselves so much. 

42 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 43 

RiDGEON. I dont believe another half-hour would do 
Mr Dubedat a bit of harm. 

Sir Patrick. Come now. Colly, come ! come ! none of 
that. You take your man home, Mrs Dubedat; and get 
him to bed before eleven. 

B. B. Yes, yes. Bed before eleven. Quite right, 
quite right. Sorry to lose you, my dear lady; but Sir 
Patrick's orders are the laws of — er — of Tyre and Sidon. 

Walpole. Let me take you home in my motor. 

Sir Patrick. No. You ought to be ashamed of 
yourself, Walpole. Your motor will take Mr and Mrs 
Dubedat to the station, and quite far enough too for an 
open carriage at night. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, I am sure the train is best. 

RiDGEON. Well, Mrs Dubedat, we have had a most 
enjoyable evening. 

Walpole. j Most enjoyable. 

B. B. ( Delightful. Charming. Unforgettable. 

Mrs Dubedat [with a touch of shy anxiety] What 
did you think of Louis? Or am I wrong to ask? 

RiDGEON. Wrong ! Why, we are all charmed with 
him. 

Walpole. Delighted. 

B. B. Most happy to have met him. A privilege, a 
real privilege. 

Sir Patrick [grunts'] ! 

Mrs Dubedat [quickly] Sir Patrick: are you un- 
easy about him? 

Sir Patrick [discreetly] I admire his drawings 
greatly, maam. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes ; but I meant — 

RiDGEON. You shall go away quite happy. He's 
worth saving. He must and shall be saved. 

Mrs Dubedat rises and gasps rvith delight, relief, and 
gratitude. They all rise except Sir Patrick and Schutz- 
macher, and come reassuringly to her. 



44 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

B. B. Certainly, cer-tainly. 

Walpole. Theres no real difficulty, if only you 
know what to do. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, how can I ever thank you! 
From this night I can begin to be happy at last. You 
dont know what I feel. 

She sits down in tears. They crowd about her to con- 
sole her. 

B. B. My dear lady: come come! come come! [^very 
persuasively^ come come! 

Walpole. Dont mind us. Have a good cry. 

RiDGEON. No: dont cry. Your husband had better 
not know that weve been talking about him. 

Mrs Dubedat [quickly pulling herself together'\ 
No, of course not. Please dont mind me. What a glo- 
rious thing it must be to be a doctor! [They laugh]. 
Dont laugh. You dont know what youve done for me. 
I never knew until now how deadly afraid I was — how 
I had come to dread the worst. I never dared let myself 
know. But now the relief has come: now I know. 

Louis Dubedat comes from the hotel, in his overcoat, 
his throat wrapped in a shawl. He is a slim young man 
of 23, physically still a stripling, and pretty, though not 
effeminate. He has turquoise blue eyes, and a trick of 
looking you straight in the face with them, which, com- 
bined with a frank smile, is very engaging. Although 
he is all nerves, and very observant and quick of appre- 
hension, he is not in the least shy. He is younger than 
Jennifer; but he patronizes her as a matter of course. 
The doctors do not put him out in the least: neither Sir 
Patrick's years nor Bloomfleld Bonington's majesty have 
the smallest apparent effect on him: he is as natural as a 
cat: he moves among men as most men move among 
things, though he is intentionally making himself agree- 
able to them on this occasion. Like all people who can 
be depended on to take care of themselves, he is welcome 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 45 

company ; and his artist's power of appealing to the im- 
agination gains him credit for all sorts of qualities and 
powers, whether he possesses them or not. 

Louis [pulling on his gloves behind Ridgeon's chair'l 
Now, Jinny-Gwinny : the motor has come round. 

RiDGEON. Why do you let him spoil your beautiful 
name like that, Mrs Dubedat? 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, on grand occasions I am Jen- 
nifer. 

B. B. You are a bachelor: you do not understand 
these things, Ridgeon. Look at me [They look]. I 
also have two names. In moments of domestic worry, I 
am simple Ralph. When the sun shines in the home, I 
am Beedle-Deedle-Dumkins. Such is married life ! Mr 
Dubedat: may I ask you to do me a favor before you go. 
Will you sign your name to this menu card, under the 
sketch you have made of me? 

Walpole. Yes ; and mine too, if you will be so good. 

Louis. Certainly. [He sits down and signs the 
cards^. 

Mrs Dubedat. Wont you sign Dr Schutzmacher's 
for him, Louis ? 

Louis. I dont think Dr Schutzmacher is pleased with 
his portrait. I'll tear it up. [He reaches across the ta- 
ble for Schutzmacher's menu card, and is about to tear it. 
Schutzmacher makes no sign], 

Ridgeon. No, no: if Loony doesnt want it, I do. 

Louis. I'll sign it for you with pleasure. [He signs 
and hands it to Ridgeon]. Ive just been making a little 
note of the river to-night : it will work up into something 
good [he shews a pocket sketch-book^. I think I'll call 
it the Silver Danube. 

B. B. Ah, charming, charming. 

Walpole. Very sweet. Youre a nailer at pastel. 

Louis coughs, first out of modesty, then from tubercu- 
losis. 



46 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

Sir Patrick. Now then, Mr Dubedat: youve had 
enough of the night air. Take him home, maam. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes. Come, Louis. 

RiDGEON. Never fear. Never mind. I'll make that 
cough all right. 

B. B. We will stimulate the phagocytes. [With ten- 
der effusion, shaking her hand] Good-night, Mrs Dube- 
dot. Good-night. Good-night. 

Walpole. If the phagocytes fail, come to me. I'll 
put you right. 

Louis. Good-night, Sir Patrick. Happy to have met 
you. 

Sir Patrick. 'Night [half a grunt], 

Mrs Dubedat. Good-night, Sir Patrick. 

Sir Patrick. Cover yourself well up. Dont think 
your lungs are made of iron because theyre better than 
his. Good-night. 

Mrs Dubedat. Thank you. Thank you. Nothing 
hurts me. Good-night. 

Louis goes out through the hotel without noticing 
Schutzmacher. Mrs Dubedat hesitates, then bows to 
him. Schutzmacher rises and bows formally, German 
fashion. She goes out, attended by Ridgeon. The rest 
resume their seats, ruminating or smoking quietly. 

B. B. [harmoniously] Dee-lightful couple! Charm- 
ing woman ! Gifted lad ! Remarkable talent ! Grace- 
ful outlines ! Perfect evening ! Great success ! Inter- 
esting case ! Glorious night ! Exquisite scenery ! Capi- 
tal dinner ! Stimulating conversation ! Restful outing ! 
Good wine! Happy ending! Touching gratitude! 
Lucky Ridgeon — 

Ridgeon [returniiig] Whats that.'' Calling me, B. 
B.? [He goes back to his seat next Sir Patrick]. 

B. B. No, no. Only congratulating you on a most 
successful evening ! Enchanting woman ! Thorough 
breeding! Gentle nature! Refined — 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 47 

Blenkinsop comes from the hotel and takes the empty 
chair next Ridgeon. 

Blenkinsop. I'm so sorry to have left you like this, 
Ridgeon ; but it was a telephone message from the police. 
Theyve found half a milkman at our level crossing with 
a prescription of mine in its pocket. Wheres Mr Dube- 
dat.? 

Ridgeon. Gone. 

Blenkinsop [rising, very pale] Gone ! 

Ridgeon. Just this moment — 

Blenkinsop. Perhaps I could overtake him — [/le 
rushes into the hotel]. 

Walpole [calling after him] He's in the motor, man, 
miles off. You can — [giving it up]. No use. 

Ridgeon. Theyre really very nice people. I confess 
I was afraid the husband would turn out an appalling 
bounder. But he's almost as charming in his way as she 
is in hers. And theres no mistake about his being a 
genius. It's something to have got a case really worth 
saving. Somebody else will have to go; but at all events 
it will be easy to find a worse man. 

Sir Patrick. How do you know.'' 

Ridgeon. Come now. Sir Paddy, no growling. Have 
something more to drink. 

Sir Patrick. No, thank you. 

Walpole. Do you see anything wrong with Dube- 
dat, B. B. ? 

B. B. Oh, a charming young fellow. Besides, after 
all, what could be wrong with him? Look at him. 
What could be wrong with him? 

Sir Patrick. There are two things that can be 
wrong with any man. One of them is a cheque. The 
other is a woman. Until you know that a man's sound 
on these two points, you know nothing about him. 

B. B. Ah, cynic, cynic ! 

Walpole. He's all right as to the cheque, for a while 



48 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

at all events. He talked to me quite frankly before din- 
ner as to the pressure of money difficulties on an artist. 
He says he has no vices and is very economical, but that 
theres one extravagance he cant afford and yet cant re- 
sist; and that is dressing his wife prettily. So I said, 
bang plump out, " Let me lend you twenty poimds, and 
pay me when your ship comes home." He was really 
very nice about it. He took it like a man ; and it was 
a pleasure to see how happy it made him, poor chap. 

B. B. [who has listened to Walpole with growing per- 
turbation] But — but — but — when was this, may I ask.^* 

Walpole. When I joined you that time down by the 
river. 

B. B. But, my dear Walpole, he had just borrowed 
ten pounds from me. 

Walpole. What ! 

Sir Patrick [grunts] ! 

B. B. [indulgently] Well, well, it was really hardly 
borrowing; for he said heaven only knew when he could 
pay me. I couldnt refuse. It appears that Mrs Dube- 
dat has taken a sort of fancy to me — 

Walpole [quickly] No: it was to me. 

B. B. Certainly not. Your name was never men- 
tioned between us. He is so wrapped up in his work 
that he has to leave her a good deal alone; and the poor 
innocent young fellow — he has of course no idea of my 
position or how busy I am — actually wanted me to call 
occasionally and talk to her. 

Walpole. Exactly what he said to me! 

B. B. Pooh ! Pooh pooh ! Really, I must say. 
[Much disturbed, he rises and goes up to the balustrade^ 
contemplating the landscape vexedly^. 

Walpole. Look here, Ridgeon ! this is beginning to 
look serious. 

Blenkinsop, very anxious and wretched, but trying to 
look unconcerned, comes back. 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 49 

RiDGEON. Well, did you catch him ? 

Blenkinsop. No. Excuse my running away like 
that. [He sits down at the foot of the table, next Bloom- 
field Bonington's chair] . 

Walpole. Anything the matter? 

Blenkinsop. Oh no. A trifle — something ridiculous. 
It cant be helped. Never mind. 

Ridgeon. Was it anything about Dubedat.^ 

Blenkinsop [almost breaking down] I ought to keep 
it to myself, I know. I cant tell you, Ridgeon, how 
ashamed I am of dragging my miserable poverty to your 
dinner after all your kindness. It's not that you wont 
ask me again ; but it's so humiliating. And I did so look 
forward to one evening in my dress clothes (they re still 
presentable, you see) with all my troubles left behind, 
just like old times. 

Ridgeon. But what has happened ? 

Blenkinsop. Oh, nothing. It's too ridiculous. I 
had just scraped up four shillings for this little outing; 
and it cost me one-and-fourpence to get here. Well, 
Dubedat asked me to lend him half-a-crown to tip the 
chambermaid of the room his wife left her wraps in, and 
for the cloakroom. He said he only wanted it for five 
minutes, as she had his purse. So of course I lent it to 
him. And he's forgotten to pay me. I've just tuppence 
to get back with. 

Ridgeon. Oh, never mind that — 

Blenkinsop [stopping him resolutely] No: I know 
what youre going to say ; but I wont take it. Ive never 
borrowed a penny; and I never will. Ive nothing left 
but my friends; and I wont sell them. If none of you 
were to be able to meet me without being afraid that my 
civility was leading up to the loan of five shillings, there 
would be an end of everything for me. I'll take your 
old clothes. Colly, sooner than disgrace you by talking to 
you in the street in my own; but I wont borrow money. 



50 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

I'll train it as far as the twopence will take me; and I'll 
tramp the rest, 

Walpole. Youll do the whole distance in my motor. 
[They are all greatly relieved; and Walpole hastens to 
get away from the painful subject by adding^ Did he 
get anything out of you, Mr Schutzmacher ? 

ScHUTZMACHER [shttkes his head in a most expressive 
negative^. 

Walpole. You didnt appreciate his drawing, I think. 

Schutzmacher. Oh yes I did. I should have liked 
very much to have kept the sketch and got it autographed. 

B. B. But why didnt you? 

Schutzmacher. Well, the fact is, when I joined 
Dubedat after his conversation with Mr Walpole, he said 
the Jews were the only people who knew anything about 
art, and that though he had to put up with your Philis- 
tine twaddle, as he called it, it was what I said about the 
drawings that really pleased him. He also said that his 
wife was greatly struck with my knowledge, and that 
she always admired Jews. Then he asked me to advance 
him .£50 on the security of the drawings. 

"I No, no. Positively! Seri- 
\^All ously! 

exclaiming V What ! Another fifty ! 
together] Think of that! 
J [grunts] ! 

Schutzmacher. Of course I couldnt lend money to 
a stranger like that. 

B. B. I envy you the power to say No, Mr Schutz- 
macher. Of course, I knew I oughtnt to lend money to 
a young fellow in that way ; but I simply hadnt the nerve 
to refuse. I couldnt very well, you know, could I ? 

Schutzmacher. I dont understand that. / felt that 
I couldnt very well lend it. 

Walpole. What did he say.'' 

Schutzmacher. Well, he made a very uncalled-for 



B. B. 

Walpole 
Blenkinsop 
Sir Patrick 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 51 

remark about a Jew not understanding the feelings of a 
gentleman. I must say you Gentiles are very hard to 
please. You say we are no gentlemen when we lend 
money; and when we refuse to lend it you say just the 
same. I didnt mean to behave badly. As I told 
him, I might have lent it to him if he had been a Jew 
himself. 

Sir Patrick l^with a grunt] And what did he say to 
that? 

ScHUTZMACHER. Oh, he began trying to persuade me 
that he was one of the chosen people — that his artistic 
faculty shewed it, and that his name was as foreign as 
my own. He said he didnt really want <£50; that he was 
only joking; that all he wanted was a couple of sov- 
ereigns. 

B. B. No, no, Mr Schutzmacher. You invented that 
last touch. Seriously, now? 

Schutzmacher. No. You cant improve on Nature 
in telling stories about gentlemen like Mr Dubedat. 

Blenkinsop. You certainly do stand by one another, 
you chosen people, Mr Schutzmacher. 

Schutzmacher. Not at all. Personally, I like Eng- 
lishmen better than Jews, and always associate with 
them. Thats only natural, because, as I am a Jew, theres 
nothing interesting in a Jew to me, whereas there is al- 
ways something interesting and foreign in an English- 
man. But in money matters it's quite different. You 
see, when an Englishman borrows, all he knows or cares 
is that he wants money ; and he'll sign anything to get it, 
without in the least understanding it, or intending to 
carry out the agreement if it turns out badly for him. In 
fact, he thinks you a cad if you ask him to carry it out 
under such circumstances. Just like the Merchant of 
Venice, you know. But if a Jew makes an agreement, he 
means to keep it and expects you to keep it. If he wants 
money for a time, he borrows it and knows he must pay 



52 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

it at the end of the time. If he knows he cant pay, he 
begs it as a gift. 

RiDGEON. Come, Loony ! do you mean to say that 
Jews are never rogues and thieves.'' 

ScHUTZMACHER. Oh, not at all. But I was not talk- 
ing of criminals, I was comparing honest Englishmen 
with honest Jews, 

One of the hotel maids, a pretty, fair-haired woman of 
about 25, comes from the hotel, rather furtively. She 
accosts Ridgeon. 

The Maid. I beg your pardon, sir — 

Ridgeon. Eh.^ 

The Maid. I beg pardon, sir. It's not about the 
hotel. I'm not allowed to be on the terrace; and I should 
be discharged if I were seen speaking to you, unless you 
were kind enough to say you called me to ask whether 
the motor has come back from the station yet. 

Walpole. Has it.'' 

The Maid. Yes, sir. 

Ridgeon. Well, what do you want? 

The Maid. Would you mind, sir, giving me the ad- 
dress of the gentleman that was with you at dinner? 

Ridgeon [sharply] Yes, of course I should mind 
very much. You have no right to ask. 

The Maid. Yes, sir, I know it looks like that. But 
what am I to do? 

Sir Patrick, Whats the matter with you? 

The Maid. Nothing, sir. I want the address: thats 
all. 

B, B, You mean the young gentleman? 

The Maid. Yes, sir: that went to catch the train 
with the woman he brought with him. 

Ridgeon. The woman! Do you mean the lady who 
dined here? the gentleman's wife? 

The Maid. Dont believe them, sir. She cant be his 
wife. I'm his wife. 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 53 



1 
B. B. 

RiDGEON 

Walpole 



[in amazed remonstrance^ My good girl ! 
You his wife ! 

What! whats that? Oh, this is getting 
perfectly fascinating, Ridgeon. 

The Maid. I could run upstairs and get you my 
marriage lines in a minute, sir, if you doubt my word. 
He's Mr Louis Dubedat, isnt he? 

Ridgeon. Yes. 

The Maid. Well, sir, you may believe me or not; but 
I'm the lawful Mrs Dubedat. 

Sir Patrick. And why arnt you living with your 
husband ? 

The Maid. We couldnt afford it, sir. I had thirty 
pounds saved; and we spent it all on our honeymoon in 
three weeks, and a lot more that he borrowed. Then I 
had to go back into service, and he went to London to 
get work at his drawing; and he never wrote me a line 
or sent me an address. I never saw nor heard of him 
again until I caught sight of him from the window going 
off in the motor with that woman. 

Sir Patrick. Well, thats two wives to start with. 

B, B. Now upon my soul I dont want to be unchari- 
table ; but really I'm beginning to suspect that our young 
friend is rather careless. 

Sir Patrick. Beginning to think ! How long will it 
take you, man, to find out that he's a damned young 
blackguard ? 

Blenkinsop. Oh, thats severe. Sir Patrick, very se- 
vere. Of course it's bigamy; but still he's very young; 
and she's very pretty. Mr Walpole: may I spunge on 
you for another of those nice cigarets of yours ? [He 
changes his seat for the one next Walpole]. 

Walpole. Certainly. [He feels in his pockets]. 
Oh bother! Where — ? [Suddenly remembering] I say: 
I recollect now : I passed ray cigaret case to Dubedat and 
he didnt return it. It was a gold one. 



54 



The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 



The Maid. He didnt mean any harm: he never thinks 
about things like that, sir. I'll get it back for you, sir, 
if youll tell me where to find him. 

RiDGEON. What am I to do? Shall I give her the 
address or not? 

Sir Patrick. Give her your own address; and then 
we'll see. [To the maid] Youll have to be content with 
that for the present, my girl. [Ridgeon gives her his 
card]. Whats your name? 

The Maid. Minnie Tinwell, sir. 

Sir Patrick. Well, you write him a letter to care of 
this gentleman; and it will be sent on. Now be off with 
you. 

The Maid. Thank you, sir. I'm sure you wouldnt 
see me wronged. Thank you all, gentlemen; and excuse 
the liberty. 

She goes into the hotel. They watch her in silence. 

RiDGEON [when she is gone] Do you realize, you 
chaps, that we have promised Mrs Dubedat to save this 
fellow's life? 

Blenkinsop. Whats the matter with him? 

RiDGEON. Tuberculosis. 

Blenkinsop [interested] And can you cure that? 

RiDGEON. I believe so. 

Blenkinsop. Then I wish youd cure me. My right 
lung is touched, I'm sorry to say. 



RiDGEON 



B. B. 



Sir Patrick 
Walpole 



[all 
together] 



What ! your 
I 



IS 



lung 
going ■ 

My dear Blenkinsop, what 
do you tell me? [full 
of concern for Blenk- 
insop, he comes back 
from the balustrade]. 

Eh? Eh? whats that? 

Hullo ! you mustnt ne- 
glect this, you know. 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 55 

Blenkinsop [putting his fingers in his ears] No, no: 
it's no use. I know what youre going to say: Ive said it 
often to others. I cant afford to take care of myself ; and 
theres an end of it. If a fortnight's holiday would save 
my life, I'd have to die. I shall get on as others have 
to get on. We cant all go to St Moritz or to Egypt, you 
know. Sir Ralph. Dont talk about it. 

Embarrassed silence. 

Sir Patrick [grunts and looks hard at Ridgeon] ! 

ScHUTZMACHER [looJcing at his watch and rising] 
I must go. It's been a very pleasant evening. 
Colly. You might let me have my portrait if you dont 
mind. I'll send Mr Dubedat that couple of sovereigns 
for it. 

Ridgeon [giving him the menu card] Oh dont do 
that, Loony. I don't think he'd like that. 

ScHUTZMACHER. Well, of coursc I shant if you feel 
that way about it. But I dont think you understand 
Dubedat. However, perhaps thats because I'm a Jew. 
Good-night, Dr Blenkinsop [shaking hands] . 

Blenkinsop. Good-night, sir — I mean — Good-night. 

ScHUTZMACHER [waving his hand to the rest] Good- 
night, everybody. 

Walpole 

B. B. 

Sir Patrick 

Ridgeon 

B. B. repeats the salutation several times, in varied 
musical tones. Schutzmacher goes out. 

Sir Patrick. It's time for us all to move. [He rises 
and comes between Blenkinsop and Walpole. Ridgeon 
also rises]. Mr Walpole: take Blenkinsop home: he's 
had enough of the open air cure for to-night. Have 
you a thick overcoat to wear in the motor, Dr Blenkin- 
sop? 

Blenkinsop. Oh, theyll give me some brown paper 



Good-night. 



56 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

in the hotel ; and a few thicknesses of brown paper across 
the chest are better than any fur coat. 

Walpole. Well^ come along. Good-night, Colly. 
Youre coming with ns, arnt you, B. B..'' 

B. B. Yes: I'm coming. [Walpole and Blenkinsop 
go into the hotel] . Good-night, my dear Ridgeon [shak- 
ing hands affectionately']. Dont let us lose sight of your 
interesting patient and his very charming wife. We must 
not judge him too hastily, you know. [With unction^ 
Gooooooood-night, Paddy. Bless you, dear old chap. 
[Sir Patrick utters a formidable grunt. B. B. laughs and 
pats him indulgently on the shoulder] Good-night. 
Good-night. Good-night. Good-night. [He good-nights 
himself into the hotel]. 

The others have meanrvhile gone without ceremony. 
Ridgeon and Sir Patrick are left alone together. Rid- 
geon, deep in thought, comes down to Sir Patrick. 

Sir Patrick. Well, Mr Savior of Lives: which is it 
to be.^ that honest decent man Blenkinsop, or that rotten 
blackguard of an artist, eh.'' 

Ridgeon. It's not an easy case to judge, is it.'' 
Blenkinsop's an honest decent man ; but is he any use ? 
Dubedat's a rotten blackguard ; but he's a genuine source 
of pretty and pleasant and good things. 

Sir Patrick. What will he be a source of for 
that poor innocent wife of his, when she finds him 
out? 

Ridgeon. Thats true. Her life will be a hell. 

Sir Patrick. And tell me this. Suppose you had 
this choice put before you: either to go through life and 
find all the pictures bad but all the men and women 
good, or to go through life and find all the pictures good 
and all the men and women rotten. Which would you 
choose? 

Ridgeon. Thats a devilishly difficult question, Paddy. 
The pictures are so agreeable, and the good people so 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 57 

infernally disagreeable and mischievous, that I really 
cant undertake to say offhand which I should prefer to 
do without. 

Sir Patrick. Come come ! none of your cleverness 
with me: I'm too old for it. Blenkinsop isnt that sort 
of good man; and you know it. 

RiDGEON. It would be simpler if Blenkinsop could 
paint Dubedat's pictures. 

Sir Patrick. It would be simpler still if Dubedat 
had some of Blenkinsop's honesty. The world isnt going 
to be made simple for you, my lad: you must take it as 
it is. Youve to hold the scales between Blenkinsop and 
Dubedat. Hold them fairly. 

RiDGEON. Well, I'll be as fair as I can. I'll put into 
one scale all the pounds Dubedat has borrowed, and into 
the other all the half-crowns that Blenkinsop hasnt bor- 
rowed. 

Sir Patrick. And youll take out of Dubedat's scale 
all the faith he has destroyed and the honor he has lost, 
and youll put into Blenkinsop's scale all the faith he has 
justified and the honor he has created. 

RiDGEON. Come come, Paddy! none of your claptrap 
with me: I'm too sceptical for it. I'm not at all con- 
vinced that the world wouldnt be a better world if every- 
body behaved as Dubedat does than it is now that every- 
body behaves as Blenkinsop does. 

Sir Patrick. Then why dont you behave as Dube- 
dat does.'' 

RiDGEON. Ah, that beats me. Thats the experimental 
test. Still, it's a dilemma. It's a dilemma. You see 
theres a complication we havnt mentioned. 

Sir Patrick. Whats that.^ 

RiDGEON. Well, if I let Blenkinsop die, at least no- 
body can say I did it because I wanted to marry his 
widow. 

Sir Patrick. Eh.'' Whats that? 



58 The Doctor's Dilemma Act II 

RiDGEON. Now if I let Dubedat die, I'll marry his 
widow. 

Sir Patrick. Perhaps she wont have you, you know. 

RiDGEON [with a self-assured shake of the head^ I've 
a pretty good flair for that sort of thing. I know when 
a woman is interested in me. She is. 

Sir Patrick. Well, sometimes a man knows best; 
and sometimes he knows worst. Youd much better cure 
them both. 

RiDGEON. I cant. I'm at my limit. I can squeeze in 
one more case, but not two. I must choose. 

Sir Patrick. Well, you must choose as if she didnt 
exist: thats clear. 

RiDGEON. Is that clear to you? Mind: it's not clear 
to me. She troubles my judgment. 

Sir Patrick. To me, it's a plain choice between a 
man and a lot of pictures. 

RiDGEON. It's easier to replace a dead man than a 
good picture. 

Sir Patrick. Colly: when you live in an age that 
runs to pictures and statues and plays and brass bands 
because its men and women are not good enough to com- 
fort its poor aching soul, you should thank Providence 
that you belong to a profession which is a high and great 
profession because its business is to heal and mend men 
and women. 

RiDGEON. In short, as a member of a high and great 
profession, I'm to kill my patient. 

Sir Patrick. Dont talk wicked nonsense. You cant 
kill him. But you can leave him in other hands. 

RiDGEON. In B. B.'s, for instance: eh? [looking at 
him significantly]. 

Sir Patrick [demurely facing his look] Sir Ralph 
Bloomfield Bonington is a very eminent physician. 

RiDGEON. He is. 

Sir Patrick. I'm going for my hat. 



Act II The Doctor's Dilemma 59 

Ridgeon strikes the bell as Sir Patrick makes for the 
hotel. A waiter comes. 

Ridgeon [io the waiter] My bill, please. 
Waiter. Yes, sir. 
He goes for it. 



ACT III 

In Duhedat's studio. Viewed from the large window 
the outer door is in the wall on the left at the near end. 
The door leading to the inner rooms is in the opposite 
wall, at the far end. The facing wall has neither window 
nor door. The plaster on all the walls is uncovered and 
undecorated, except by scrawlings of charcoal sketches 
and memoranda. There is a studio throne (a chair on a 
dais^ a little to the left, opposite the inner door, and an 
easel to the right, opposite the outer door, with a dilapi- 
dated chair at it. Near the easel and against the wall is 
a hare wooden table with bottles and jars of oil and me- 
dium, paint-smudged rags, tubes of color, brushes, char- 
coal, a small lay figure, a kettle and spirit-lamp, and 
other odds and ends. By the table is a sofa, littered with 
drawing blocks, sketch-books , loose sheets of paper, news- 
papers, books, and more smudged rags. Next the outer 
door is an umbrella and hat stand, occupied partly by 
Louis' hats and cloak and muffler, and partly by odds 
and ends of costumes. There is an old piano stool on the 
near side of this door. In the corner near the inner door 
is a little tea-table. A lay figure, in a cardinal's robe and 
hat, with an hour-glass in one hand and a scythe slung 
on its back, smiles with inane malice at Louis, who, in 
a milkman's smock much smudged with colors, is painting 
a piece of brocade which he has draped about his wife. 
She is sitting on the throne, not interested in the paint- 

60 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 61 

ing, and appealing to him very anxiously about another 
matter. 

Mrs Dubedat. Promise, 

Louis [putting on a touch of paint with notable skill 
and care and answering quite perfunctorily] I promise, 
my darling. 

Mrs Dubedat. When you want money, you will al- 
ways come to me. 

Louis. But it's so sordid, dearest. I hate money, I 
cant keep always bothering you for money, money, 
money. Thats what drives me sometimes to ask other 
people, though I hate doing it. 

Mrs Dubedat. It is far better to ask me, dear. It 
gives people a wrong idea of you. 

Louis. But I want to spare your little fortvme, and 
raise money on my own work. Dont be unhappy, love: 
I can easily earn enough to pay it all back. I shall have 
a one-man-show next season ; and then there will be no 
more money troubles. [Putting down his palette'\ 
There ! I mustnt do any more on that until it's bone-dry ; 
so you may come down. 

Mrs Dubedat [throwing off the drapery as she steps 
down, and revealing a plain frock of tussore silk] 
But you have promised, remember, seriously and faith- 
fully, never to borrow again vmtil you have first asked 
me, 

Louis, Seriously and faithfully. [Embracing her"] 
Ah, my love, how right you are! how much it means to 
me to have you by me to guard me against living too 
much in the skies. On my solemn oath, from this moment 
forth I will never borrow another penny. 

Mrs Dubedat [delighted] Ah, thats right. Does his 
wicked worrying wife torment him and drag him down 
from the clouds. [She kisses him]. And now, dear, 
wont you finish those drawings for Maclean? 



62 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

Louis. Oh, they dont matter. Ive got nearly all the 
money from him in advance. 

Mrs Dubedat. But, dearest, that is just the reason 
why you should finish them. He asked me the other day 
whether you really intended to finish them. 

Louis. Confound his impudence! What the devil 
does he take me for } Now that j ust destroys all my in- 
terest in the beastly job. Ive a good mind to throw up 
the commission, and pay him back his money. 

Mrs Dubedat. We cant afford that, dear. You had 
better finish the drawings and have done with them. I 
think it is a mistake to accept money in advance. 
Louis. But how are we to live? 

Mrs Dubedat. Well, Louis, it is getting hard enough 
as it is, now that they are all refusing to pay except on 
delivery. 

Louis. Damn those fellows ! they think of nothing 
and care for nothing but their wretched money. 

Mrs Dubedat. Still, if they pay us, they ought to 
have what they pay for. 

Louis [coaxing] There now: thats enough lecturing 
for to-day. Ive promised to be good, havnt I? 

Mrs Dubedat [putting her arms round his neck] 
You know that I hate lecturing, and that I dont for a 
moment misunderstand you, dear, dont you ? 

Louis [fondly] I know. I know. I'm a wretch; 
and youre an angel. Oh, if only I were strong enough 
to work steadily, I'd make my darling's house a temple, 
and her shrine a chapel more beautiful than was ever im- 
agined. I cant pass the shops without wrestling with 
the temptation to go in and order all the really good 
things they have for you. 

Mrs Dubedat. I want nothing but you, dear. [She 
gives him a caress, to which he responds so passionately 
that she disengages herself]. There! be good now: re- 
member that the doctors are coming this morning. Isnt 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 63 

it extraordinarily kind of them, Louis, to insist on com- 
ing? all of them, to consult about you? 

Louis [coolly] Oh, I daresay they think it will be a 
feather in their cap to cure a rising artist. They wouldnt 
come if it didnt amuse them, anyhow. [Someone knocks 
at the door]. I say: it's not time yet, is it? 

Mrs Dudebat. No, not quite yet. 

Louis [opening the door and finding Ridgeon there] 
Hello, Ridgeon. Delighted to see you. Come in. 

Mrs Dudebat [shaking hands] It's so good of you 
to come, doctor. 

Louis. Excuse this place, wont you? It's only a 
studio, you know: theres no real convenience for living 
here. But we pig along somehow, thanks to Jennifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Now I'll run away. Perhaps later 
on, when youre finished with Louis, I may come in and 
hear the verdict. [Ridgeon bows rather constrainedly]. 
Would you rather I didnt? 

Ridgeon. Not at all. Not at all. 

Mrs Dubedat looks at him, a little puzzled by his for- 
mal manner; then goes into the inner room. 

Louis [flippantly] I say: dont look so grave, Theres 
nothing awful going to happen, is there? 

Ridgeon. No. 

Louis. Thats all right. Poor Jennifer has been look- 
ing forward to your visit more than you can imagine. 
Shes taken quite a fancy to you, Ridgeon. The poor girl 
has nobody to talk to: I'm always painting. [Taking up 
a sketch] Theres a little sketch I made of her yesterday, 

Ridgeon. She shewed it to me a fortnight ago when 
she first called on me. 

Louis [quite unabashed] Oh! did she? Good Lord! 
how time does fly! I could have sworn I'd only just fin- 
ished it. It's hard for her here, seeing me piling up 
drawings and nothing coming in for them. Of course I 
shall sell them next year fast enough, after my one-man- 



64 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

show; but while the grass grows the steed starves. I hate 
to have her coming to me for money, and having none 
to give her. But what can I do? 

RiDGEON. I understood that Mrs Dubedat had some 
property of her own. 

Louis. Oh yes, a little ; but how could a man with 
any decency of feeling touch that.'' Suppose I did, what 
would she have to live on if I died.'' I'm not insured: 
cant afford the premiums. [Picking out another draw- 
ing'] How do you like that.'' 

RiDGEON [putting it aside] I have not come here to- 
day to look at your drawings. I have more serious and 
pressing business with you. 

Louis. You want to sound my wretched lung. [With 
impulsive candor] My dear Ridgeon: I'll be frank with 
you. Whats the matter in this house isnt lungs but bills. 
It doesnt matter about me; but Jennifer has actually to 
economize in the matter of food. Youve made us feel 
that we can treat you as a friend. Will you lend us a 
hundred and fifty pounds? 

RiDGEON. No, 

Louis [surprised] Why not? 

RiDGEON. I am not a rich man; and I want every 
penny I can spare and more for my researches. 

Louis. You mean youd want the money back again. 

RiDGEON. I presume people sometimes have that in 
view when they lend money. 

Louis [after a moment's reflection] Well, I can man- 
age that for you. I'll give you a cheque — or see here: 
theres no reason why you shouldnt have your bit too: I'll 
give you a cheque for two hundred, 

RiDGEON. Why not cash the cheque at once without 
troubling me? 

Louis. Bless you! they wouldnt cash it: I'm over- 
drawn as it is. No: the way to work it is this. I'll post- 
date the cheque next October. In October Jennifer's 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 65 

dividends come in. Well, you present the cheque. It 
will be returned marked " refer to drawer " or some rub- 
bish of that sort. Then you can take it to Jennifer, and 
hint that if the cheque isnt taken up at once I shall be 
put in prison. She'll pay you like a shot. Youll clear 
£50; and youll do me a real service; for I do want the 
money very badly, old chap, I assure you. 

RiDGEON [staring at him] You see no objection to the 
transaction ; and you anticipate none from me ! 

Louis. Well, what objection can there be? It's quite 
safe. I can convince you about the dividends. 

RiDGEON. I mean on the score of its being — shall I 
say dishonorable.'' 

Louis. Well, of course I shouldnt suggest it if I 
didnt want the money. 

RiDGEON. Indeed! Well, you will have to find some 
other means of getting it. 

Louis. Do you mean that you refuse? 

RiDGEON. Do I mean — ! [letting his indignation 
loose] Of course I refuse, man. What do you take me 
for? How dare you make such a proposal to me? 

Louis. Why not? 

RiDGEON. Faugh ! You would not understand me if 
I tried to explain. Now, once for all, I will not lend you 
a farthing. I should be glad to help your wife ; but lend- 
ing you money is no service to her. 

Louis. Oh well, if youre in earnest about helping her, 
I'll tell you what you might do. You might get your 
patients to buy some of my things, or to give me a few 
portrait commissions. 

RiDGEON. My patients call me in as a physician, not 
as a commercial traveller. 

A knock at the door. Louis goes unconcernedly to 
open it, pursuing the subject as he goes. 

Louis. But you must have great influence with them. 
You must know such lots of things about them — private 



66 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

things that they wouldnt like to have known. They 
wouldnt dare to refuse you. 

RiDGEON [exploding] Well, upon my — 

Louis opens the door, and admits Sir Patrick, Sir 
Ralph, and Walpole. 

RiDGEON [^proceeding furiously] Walpole: Ive been 
here hardly ten minutes ; and already he's tried to borrow 
^150 from me. Then he proposed that I should get the 
money for him by blackmailing his wife; and youve just 
interrupted him in the act of suggesting that I should 
blackmail my patients into sitting to him for their por- 
traits. 

Louis. Well, Ridgeon, if this is what you call being 
an honorable man ! I spoke to you in confidence. 

Sir Patrick. We're all going to speak to you in con- 
fidence, young man. 

Walpole [hanging his hat on the only peg left vacant 
on the hat-stand] We shall make ourselves at home for 
half an hour, Dubedat. Dont be alarmed: youre a most 
fascinating chap; and we love you. 

Louis. Oh, all right, all right. Sit down — anywhere 
you can. Take this chair. Sir Patrick [indicating the 
one on the throne]. Up-z-z-z ! [helping him up: Sir 
Patrick grunts and enthrones himself]. Here you are, 
B. B. [Sir Ralph glares at the familiarity ; hut Louis, 
quite undisttirhed, puts a big book and a sofa cushion on 
the dais, on Sir Patrick's right; and B. B. sits down, 
under p7-otest]. Let me take your hat. [He takes B. 
B.'s hat unceremoniously , and substitutes it for the car- 
dinal's hat on the head of the lay figure, thereby ingeni- 
ously destroying the dignity of the conclave. He then 
draws the piano stool from the wall and offers it to Wal- 
pole]. You dont mind this, Walpole, do you? [Walpole 
accepts the stool, and puts his hand into his pocket for 
his cigaret case. Missing it, he is reminded of his 



Act hi The Doctor's Dilemma 67 

Walpole. By the way, I'll trouble you for my eiga- 
ret case, if you dont mind? 

Louis. What cigaret case? 

Walpole. The gold one I lent you ar the Star and 
Garter. 

Louis [surprised] Was that yours ? 

Walpole. Yes. 

Louis. I'm awfully sorry, old chap. I wondered 
whose it was. I'm sorry to say this is all thats left of it. 
[He hitches up his smock; produces a card from his 
waistcoat pocket; and hands it to Walpole]. 

Walpole. A pawn ticket ! 

Louis [reassuringly] It's quite safe: he cant sell it 
for a year, you know. I say, my dear Waljjole, I am 
sorry. [Fie places his hand ingenuously on Walpole's 
shoulder and looks frankly at him]. 

Walpole [sinking on the stool with a gasp] Dont 
mention it. It adds to your fascination. 

RiDGEON [who has been standing near the easel] Be- 
fore we go any further, you have a debt to pay, Mr 
Dubedat. 

Louis. I have a precious lot of debts to pay, Ridgeon. 
I'll fetch you a chair. [He makes for the inner door]. 

Ridgeon [stopping /«'m] You shall not leave the 
room until you pay it. It's a small one; and pay it you 
must and shall. I dont so much mind your borrowing 
^10 from one of mj'^ guests and £20 from the other — 

Walpole. I walked into it, you know. I offered it. 

Ridgeon. — they could afford it. But to clean poor 
Blenkinsop out of his last half-crown was damnable. I 
intend to give him that half-crown and to be in a position 
to pledge him my word that you paid it. I'll have that 
out of you, at all events. 

B. B. Quite right, Ridgeon. Quite right. Come, 
young man ! down with the dust. Pay up. 

Louis. Oh, you neednt make such a fuss about it. 



68 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

Of course I'll pay it. I had no idea the poor fellow was 
hard up. I'm as shocked as any of you about it. [Put- 
ting his hand into his pocket] Here you are. [Finding 
his pocket empty] Oh, I say, I havnt any money on me 
just at present. Walpole: would you mind lending me 
half-a-crown just to settle this. 

Walpole. Lend you half — [his voice faints away]. 

Louis. Well, if you dont, Blenkinsop wont get it; 
for I havnt a rap : you may search my pockets if you like. 

Walpole. Thats conclusive. [He produces half-a- 
crown]. 

Louis [passing it to Ridgeon] There! I'm really 
glad thats settled : it was the only thing that was on my 
conscience. Now I hope youre all satisfied. 

Sir Patrick. Not quite, Mr Dubedat. Do you hap- 
pen to know a young woman named Minnie Tinwell.'' 

Louis. Minnie! I should think I do; and Minnie 
knows me too. She's a really nice good girl, considering 
her station. Whats become of her.'' 

Walpole. It's no use bluffing, Dubedat. Weve 
seen Minnie's marriage lines. 

Louis [coolly] Indeed? Have you seen Jennifer's.'' 

Ridgeon [rising in irrepressible rage] Do you dare 
insinuate that Mrs Dubedat is living with you without 
being married to you? 

Louis. Why not? 

B. B. ^ [echoing him in Why not! 

Sir Patrick [ various tones of ^ Why not! 

Ridgeon j scandalized Why not! 

Walpole J amazement] I Why not! 

Louis. Yes, why not? Lots of people do it: just as 
good people as you. Why dont you learn to think, in- 
stead of bleating and baahing like a lot of sheep when 
you come up against anything youre not accustomed to? 
[Contemplating their amazed faces with a chuckle] I 
say: I should like to draw the lot of you now: you do 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 69 

look jolly foolish. Especially you^ Ridgeon. I had you 
that time^ you know. 

Ridgeon. How, pray? 

Louis. Well, you set up to appreciate Jennifer, you 
know. And you despise me, dont you.'' 

Ridgeon [curtly'\ I loathe you. [He sits down again 
on the sofa], 

Louis. Just so. And yet you believe that Jennifer 
is a bad lot because you think I told you so, 

Ridgeon. Were you lying.'' 

Louis. No; but you were smelling out a scandal in- 
stead of keeping your mind clean and wholesome. I can 
just play with people like you. I only asked you had 
you seen Jennifer's marriage lines; and you concluded 
straight away that she hadnt got any. You dont know 
a lady when you see one. 

B. B. [majestically] What do you mean by that, may 
I ask.? 

Louis. Now, I'm only an immoral artist; but if 
youd told me that Jennifer wasnt married, I'd have had 
the gentlemanly feeling and artistic instinct to say that 
she carried her marriage certificate in her face and in her 
character. But you are all moral men; and Jennifer is 
only an artist's wife — probably a model; and morality 
consists in suspecting other people of not being legally 
married. Arnt you ashamed of yourselves ? Can one of 
you look me in the face after it? 

Walpole. It's very hard to look you in the face, 
Dubedat; you have such a dazzling cheek. What about 
Minnie Tinwell, eh? 

Louis. Minnie Tinwell is a young woman who has 
had three weeks of glorious happiness in her poor little 
life, which is more than most girls in her position get, I 
can tell you. Ask her whether she'd take it back if she 
could. She's got her name into history, that girl. My 
little sketches of her will be fought by collectors at Chris- 



70 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

tie's. She'll have a page in my biography. Pretty good, 
that, for a still-room maid at a seaside hotel, I think. 
What have you fellows done for her to compare with 
that.? 

RiDGKON. We havnt trapped her into a mock mar- 
riage and deserted her. 

Louis. No: you wouldnt have the pluck. But dont 
fuss yourselves. I didnt desert little Minnie. We spent 
all our money — 

Walpole. All her money. Thirty pounds. 

Louis. I said all our money: hers and mine too. 
Her thirty pounds didnt last three days. I had to bor- 
row four times as much to spend on her. But I didnt 
grudge it; and she didnt grudge her few pounds either, 
the brave little lassie. When we were cleaned out, we'd 
had enough of it: you can hardly suppose that we were 
fit company for longer than that: I an artist, and she 
quite out of art and literature and refined living and 
everything else. There was no desertion, no misunder- 
standing, no police court or divorce court sensation for 
you moral chaps to lick your lips over at breakfast. We 
just said. Well, the money's gone: weve had a good time 
that can never be taken from us ; so kiss ; part good 
friends; and she back to service, and I back to my studio 
and my Jennifer, both the better and happier for our 
holiday. 

Walpole. Quite a little poem, by George! 

B. B. If you had been scientifically trained, Mr 
Dubedat, you would know how very seldom an actual 
case bears out a principle. In medical practice a man 
may die when, scientifically speaking, he ought to have 
lived. I have actually known a man die of a disease 
from which he was scientifically speaking, immune. But 
that does not affect the fundamental truth of science. In 
just the same way, in moral cases, a man's behavior may 
be quite harmless and even beneficial, when he is morally 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 71 

behaving like a scoundrel. And lie may do great harm 
when he is morally acting on the highest principles. But 
that does not affect the fundamental truth of morality. 

Sir Patrick. And it doesnt affect the criminal law 
on the subject of bigamy. 

Louis. Oh bigamy ! bigamy ! bigamy ! What a fas- 
cination anything connected with the police has for you 
all, you moralists ! Ive proved to you that you were ut- 
terly wrong on the moral point: now I'm going to shew 
you that youre utterly wrong on the legal point; and I 
hope it will be a lesson to you not to be so jolly cocksure 
next time. 

Walpole. Rot ! You were married already when 
you married her; and that settles it. 

Louis. Does it! Why cant you think? How do 
you know she wasnt married already too? 

B. B. ^ [all ^ Walpole! Ridgeon! 

RiDGEON ^ crying ( This is beyond everything ! 

Walpole [ out f Well, damn me ! 

Sir Patrick J together^ J You young rascal. 

Louis [ignoring their outcry] She was married to the 
steward of a liner. He cleared out and left her ; and she 
thought, poor girl, that it was the law that if you hadnt 
heard of your husband for three years you might marry 
again. So as she was a thoroughly respectable girl and 
refused to have anything to say to me unless we were 
married I went through the ceremony to please her and 
to preserve her self-respect. 

Ridgeon. Did you tell her you were already mar- 
ried ? 

Louis. Of course not. Dont you see that if she had 
known, she wouldnt have considered herself my wife? 
You dont seem to understand, somehow. 

Sir Patrick. You let her risk imprisonment in her 
ignorance of the law? 

Louis. Well, I risked imprisonment for her sake. I 



72 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

could have been had up for it just as much as she. But 
when a man makes a sacrifice of that sort for a woman, 
he doesnt go and brag about it to her ; at least, not if he's 
a gentleman. 

Walpole. What are we to do with this daisy? 

Louis [impatiently] Oh, go and do whatever the devil 
you please. Put INIinnie in prison. Put me in prison. 
Kill Jennifer with the disgrace of it all. And then, when 
youve done all the mischief you can, go to church and 
feel good about it. [He sits down pettishly on the old 
chair at the easel, and takes up a sketching block, on 
which he begins to drarv] 

Walpole. He's got us. 

Sir Patrick [grimly] He has. 

B. B. But is he to be allowed to defy the criminal 
law of the land.'' 

Sir Patrick. The criminal law is no use to decent 
people. It only helps blackguards to blackmail their 
families. What are we family doctors doing half our 
time but conspiring witli the family solicitor to keep some 
rascal out of jail and some family out of disgrace.'' 

B. B. But at least it will punish him. 

Sir Patrick. Oh, yes: itll punish him. Itll punish 
not only him but everybody connected with him, inno- 
cent and guilty alike. Itll throw his board and lodging 
on our rates and taxes for a couple of years, and then 
turn him loose on us a more dangerous blackguard than 
ever. Itll put the girl in prison and ruin her : itll lay his 
wife's life waste. You may put the criminal law out 
of your head once for all: it's only fit for fools and 
savages. 

Louis. Would you mind turning your face a little 
more this way. Sir Patrick. [Sir Patrick tm-ns indig- 
nantly and glares at him]. Oh, thats too much. 

Sir Patrick. Put down your foolish pencil, man; 
and think of your position. You can defy the laws made 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 73 

by men; but there are other laws to reckon with. Do 
you know that youre going to die? 

Louis. We're all going to die, arnt we? 

Walpole. We're not all going to die in six months. 

Louis. How do you know ? 

This for B. B. is the last straw. He completely 
loses his temper and begins to walk excitedly about. 

B. B. Upon my soul, I will not stand this. It is 
in questionable taste under any circumstances or in 
any company to harp on the subject of death; but it 
is a dastardly advantage to take of a medical man. 
[Thunderiiig at Dubedat] I will not allow it, do you 
hear? 

Louis. Well, I didn't begin it: you chaps did. It's 
always the way with the inartistic professions: when 
theyre beaten in argument they fall back on intimida- 
tion. I never knew a lawyer who didnt threaten to put 
me in prison sooner or later, I never knew a parson 
who didnt threaten me with damnation. And now you 
threaten me with death. With all your talk youve only 
one real trump in your hand, and thats Intimidation. 
Well, I'm not a coward; so it's no use with me. 

B. B. [advancing upon him] I'll tell you what you 
are, sir. Youre a scoundrel. 

Louis. Oh, I don't mind you calling me a scoundrel 
a bit. It's only a word: a word that you dont know the 
meaning of. What is a scoundrel? 

B. B. You are a scoundrel, sir. 

Louis. Just so. What is a scoundrel? I am. 'N^Tiat 
am I? A scoundrel. It's just arguing in a circle. And 
you imagine youre a man of science ! 

B. B. I — I — I — I have a good mind to take you by 
the scruff of your neck, you infamous rascal, and give 
you a sound thrashing. 

Louis. I wish you would. Youd pay me something 
handsome to keep it out of court afterwards. [B. B., 



74 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

baffled, flings away from him with a snort^. Have you 
any more civilities to address to nie in my own house? 
I should like to get them over before my wife comes 
back, [i/e resumes his sketching^. 

RiDGEON. My mind's made up. When the law breaks 
down, honest men must find a remedy for themselves. 
I will not lift a finger to save this reptile. 

B. B. That is the word I was trying to remember. 
Reptile. 

Walpole. I cant help rather liking you, Dubedat. 
But you certainly are a thoroughgoing specimen. 

Sir Patrick. You know our opinion of you now, at 
all events. 

Louis [patiently putting down his pencil] Look here. 
All this is no good. You dont understand. You imag- 
ine that I'm simply an ordinary criminal. 

Walpole. Not an ordinary one, Dubedat. Do your- 
self justice. 

Louis. Well youre on the wrong tack altogether. I'm 
not a criminal. All your moralizings have no value for 
me. I don't believe in morality. I'm a disciple of 
Bernard Shaw. 

f [puzzled] Eh? 

Sir Patrick I J [waving his hand as if the subject 

B. B. were now disposed of] Thats 

l^ enough: I wish to hear no more. 

Louis. Of course I havnt the ridiculous vanity to set 
up to be exactly a Superman; but still, it's an ideal that 
I strive towards just as any other man strives towards 
his ideal. 

B. B. [intolerant] Dont trouble to explain. I now 
understand you perfectly. Say no more, please. When 
a man pretends to discuss science, morals, and religion, 
and then avows himself a follower of a notorious and 
avowed anti-vaccinationist, there is nothing more to be 
said. [Suddenly piitting in an effusive saving clause in 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 75 

parenthesis to Ridgeon] Not, my dear Ridgeon, that 
I believe in vaccination in the popular sense any 
more than you do: I neednt tell you that. But there 
are things that place a man socially; and anti-vacci- 
nation is one of them. [He resumes his seat on the 
dais]. 

Sir Patrick. Bernard Shaw.-* I never heard of him. 
He's a Methodist preacher, I suppose. 

Louis [scandalized] No, no. He's the most ad- 
vanced man now living: he isn't anything. | 

Sir Patrick. I assure you, young man, my father 
learnt the doctrine of deliverance from sin from John 
Wesley's own lips before you or Mr. Shaw were born. 
It used to be very popular as an excuse for putting sand 
in sugar and water in milk. Youre a sound Methodist, 
my lad; only you don't know it. 

Louis [seriously annoyed for the first time] It's an 
intellectual insult. I don't believe theres such a thing 
as sin. 

Sir Patrick. Well, sir, there are people who dont 
believe theres such a thing as disease either. They call 
themselves Christian Scientists, I believe. Theyll just 
suit your complaint. We can do nothing for you. [He 
rises]. Good afternoon to you. 

Louis [running to him piteously] Oh dont get up, 
Sir Patrick. Don't go. Please dont. I didnt mean to 
shock you, on my word. Do sit down again. Give me 
another chance. Two minutes more: thats all I ask. 

Sir Patrick [surprised by this sign of grace, and a 
little touched^ Well — [He sits down^ — 

Louis [gratefully] Thanks awfully. 

Sir Patrick [continuing] — I don't mind giving you 
two minutes more. But dont address yourself to me; 
for Ive retired from practice ; and I dont pretend to 
be able to cure your complaint. Your life is in the 
hands of these gentlemen. 



76 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

RiDGEON. Not in mine. My hands are full. I have 
no time and no means available for this case. 

Sir Patrick. What do you say, Mr. Walpole? 

Walpole. Oh, I'll take him in hand: I dont mind. 
I feel perfectly convinced that this is not a moral case 
at all: it's a physical one. Theres something abnormal 
about his brain. That means, probably, some morbid 
condition affecting the spinal cord. And that means the 
circulation. In short, it's clear to me that he's suffering 
from an obscure form of blood-poisoning, which is almost 
certainly due to an accumulation of ptomaines in the 
nuciform sac. I'll remove the sac — 

Louis [changing color] Do you mean, operate on me? 
Ugh! No, thank you. 

Walpole. Never fear: you wont feel anything. 
Youll be under an anaesthetic, of course. And it will be 
extraordinarily interesting. 

Louis. Oh, well, if it would interest you, and if it 
wont hurt, thats another matter. How much will you 
give me to let you do it? 

Walpole [rising indignantly] How much! What do 
you mean? 

Louis. Well, you don't expect me to let you cut me 
up for nothing, do you? 

Walpole. Will you paint my portrait for nothing? 

Louis. No; but I'll give you the portrait when it's 
painted; and you can sell it afterwards for perhaps 
double the money. But I cant sell my nuciform sac 
when youve cut it out. 

Walpole. Ridgeon: did you ever hear anything like 
this! [To Louis] Well, you can keep your nuciform sac, 
and your tubercular lung, and your diseased brain: Ive 
done with you. One would think I was not conferring a 
favor on the fellow! [He returns to his stool in high 
dudgeon] . 

Sir Patrick. That leaves only one medical man who 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 77 

has not withdrawn from your case, Mr. Dubedat. You 
have nobody left to appeal to now but Sir Ralph Bloom- 
field Bonington. 

Walpole. If I were you, B. B., I shouldnt touch 
him with a pair of tongs. Let him take his lungs to the 
Brompton Hospital. They wont cure him; but theyll 
teach him manners. 

B. B. My weakness is that I have never been able to 
say No, even to the most thoroughly undeserving peo- 
ple. Besides, I am bound to say that I dont think it 
is possible in medical practice to go into the question 
of the value of the lives we save. Just consider, Ridgeon. 
Let me put it to you, Paddy. Clear your mind of cant, 
Walpole. 

Walpole [indignantly] My mind is clear of cant. 

B. B. Quite so. Well now, look at my practice. 
It is what I suppose you would call a fashionable prac- 
tice, a smart practice, a practice among the best people. 
You ask me to go into the question of whether my pa- 
tients are of any use either to themselves or anyone else. 
Well, if you apply any scientific test known to me, you 
will achieve a reductio ad absurdum. You will be driven 
to the conclusion that the majority of them would be, as 
my friend Mr J. M. Barrie has tersely phrased it, better 
dead. Better dead. There are exceptions, no doubt. 
For instance, there is the court, an essentially social- 
democratic institution, supported out of public funds by 
the public because the public wants it and likes it. My 
court patients are hard-working people who give satis- 
faction, undoubtedly. Then I have a duke or two whose 
estates are probably better managed than they would 
be in public hands. But as to most of the rest, if I once 
began to argue about them, unquestionably the verdict 
would be. Better dead. When they actually do die, I 
sometimes have to offer that consolation, thinly disguised, 
to the family. {Lulled by the cadences of his own voice. 



78 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

he becomes drowsier and dr i^'sier]. The fact that they 
spend money so extravaganiiy on medical attendance 
really would not justify me in wasting my talents — such 
as they are — in keeping them alive. After all^ if my 
fees are high, I have to spend heavily. My own tastes 
are simple: a camp bed, a couple of rooms, a crust, a 
bottle of wine; and I am happy and contented. My 
wife's tastes are perhaps more luxurious; but even she 
deplores an expenditure the sole object of which is to 
maintain the state my patients require from their med- 
ical attendant. The — er — er — er — ^suddenly waking 
up] I have lost the thread of these remarks. What was 
I talking about, Ridgeon? 

RiDGEON. About Dubedat. 

B. B. Ah yes. Precisely. Thank you. Dubedat, of 
course. Well, what is our friend Dubedat? A vicious 
and ignorant young man with a talent for drawing. 

Louis. Thank you. Dont mind me. 

B. B. But then, what are many of my patients ? 
Vicious and ignorant young men without a talent for 
anything. If I were to stop to argue about their merits 
I should have to give up three-quarters of my practice. 
Therefore I have made it a rule not so to argue. Now, 
as an honorable man, having made that rule as to paying 
patients, can I make an exception as to a patient who, 
far from being a paying patient, may more fitly be de- 
scribed as a borrowing patient.^ No. I say No. Mr 
Dubedat: your moral character is nothing to me. I look 
at you from a purely scientific point of view. To me you 
are simply a field of battle in which an invading army 
of tubercle bacilli struggles with a patriotic force of 
phagocytes. Having made a promise to your wife, which 
my principles will not allow me to break, to stimulate 
those phagocytes, I will stimulate them. And I take no 
further responsibility. \^He flings himself bach in his 
seat exhausted]. 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 79 

Sir Patrick. Well, IVTr Dubedat, as Sir Ralph has 
very kindly offered to take charge of your case, and as 
the twr minutes I promised you are up, I must ask you 
to excuse me. [He rises], 

Louis. Oh, certainly. Ive quite done with you. 
[^Rising and holding up the sketch block] There! While 
youve been talking, Ive been doing. What is there left 
of your moralizing.'' Only a little carbonic acid gas 
which makes the room unhealthy. What is there left of 
my work.'' That. Look at it [Ridgeon rises to look 
at it]. 

Sir Patrick [who has come down to him from the 
throne] You young rascal, was it drawing me you 
were? 

Louis. Of course. What else.'' 

Sir Patrick [takes the drawing from him and grunts 
approvingly] Thats rather good. Dont you think so. 
Colly ? 

RiDGEON. Yes. So good that I should like to have it. 

Sir Patrick. Thank you; but I should like to have it 
myself. What d'ye think, Walpole? 

Walpole [rising and coming over to look] No, by 
Jove: I must have this. 

Louis. I wish I could afford to give it to you. Sir 
Patrick. But I'd pay five guineas sooner than part 
with it. 

RiDGEON. Oh, for that matter, I will give you six 
for it. 

Walpole. Ten. 

Louis. I think Sir Patrick is morally entitled to it, 
as he sat for it. May I send it to your house. Sir Patrick, 
for twelve guineas ? 

Sir Patrick. Twelve guineas! Not if you were 
President of the Royal Academy, young man. [He gives 
him back the drawing decisively and turns away, taking 
up his hat]. 



80 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

Louis [to B. B.] Would you like to take it at twelve, 
Sir Ralph? 

B. B. [coming between Louis and Walpole] Twelve 
guineas? Thank you: I'll take it at that. [He takes 
it and presents it to Sir Patrick]. Accept it from me, 
Paddy; and may you long be spared to contemplate it. 

Sir Patrick. Thank you. [He puts the drawing 
into his hat]. 

B. B. I neednt settle with you now, Mr Dubedat: 
my fees will come to more than that. [He also retrieves 
his hat]. 

Louis [indignantly] Well, of all the mean — [words 
fail him] ! I'd let myself be shot sooner than do a thing 
like that. I consider youve stolen that drawing. 

Sir Patrick [drily] So weve converted you to a be- 
lief in morality after all, eh? 

Louis. Yah! [To Walpole] I'll do another one for 
you, Walpole, if youll let me have the ten you promised. 

Walpole. Very good. I'll pay on delivery. 

Louis. Oh! What do you take me for? Have you 
no confidence in my honor? 

Walpole. None whatever. 

Louis. Oh well, of course if you feel that way, you 
cant help it. Before you go, Sir Patrick, let me fetch 
Jennifer. I know she'd like to see you, if you dont mind. 
[He goes to the inner door]. And now, before she comes 
in, one word. Youve all been talking here pretty freely 
about me — in my own house too. I dont mind that: I'm 
a man and can take care of myself. But when Jennifer 
comes in, please remember that she's a lady, and that 
you are supposed to be gentlemen. [He goes out]. 

Walpole. Well ! ! ! [He gives the situation up as in- 
describable, and goes for his hat]. 

RiDGEON. Damn his impudence ! 

B, B. I shouldnt be at all surprised to learn that 
he's well connected. Whenever I meet dignity and self- 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 81 

possession without any discoverable basis^ I diagnose 
good family. 

RiDGEON. Diagnose artistic genius, B. B. Thats 
what saves his self-respect. 

Sir Patrick. The world is made like that. The 
decent fellows are always being lectured and put out of 
countenance by the snobs. 

B. B. [altogether refusing to accept this] I am not 
out of countenance. I should like, by Jupiter, to see 
the man who could put me out of countenance. [Jen- 
nifer comes in]. Ah, Mrs. Dubedat! And how are we 
to-day .'' 

Mrs Dubedat [shaking hands with him] Thank you 
all so much for coming. [She shakes Walpole's hand]. 
Thank you, Sir Patrick [she shakes Sir Patrick's]. Oh, 
life has been worth living since I have known you. Since 
Richmond I have not known a moment's fear. And it 
used to be nothing but fear. Wont you sit down and tell 
me the result of the consultation.'' 

Walpole. I'll go, if you dont mind, Mrs. Dubedat. 
I have an appointment. Before I go, let me say that 
I am quite agreed with my colleagues here as to the 
character of the case. As to the cause and the remedy, 
thats not my business: I'm only a surgeon; and these 
gentlemen are physicians and will advise you. I may 
have my own views : in fact I h a v e them ; and they are 
perfectly well known to my colleagues. If I am needed 
— and needed I shall be finally — they know where to find 
me; and I am always at your service. So for to-day, 
good-bye. [He goes out, leaving Jennifer much puz- 
zled by his unexpected withdrawal and formal manner]. 

Sir Patrick. I also will ask you to excuse me, Mrs 
Dubedat. 

RiDGEON [anxiously] Are you going? 

Sir Patrick. Yes: I can be of no use here; and I 
must be getting back. As you know, maam, I'm not in 



82 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

practice now; and I shall not be in charge of the case. 
It rests between Sir Colenso Ridgeon and Sir Ralph 
Bloomfield Bonington. They know my opinion. Good 
afternoon to you, maam. [i/e bows and makes for the 
door] . 

Mrs Dubedat \^detaining him] Theres nothing 
wrong, is there? You dont think Louis is worse, do 
you? 

Sir Patrick. No: he's not worse. Just the same 
as at Richmond. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, thank you: you frightened me. 
Excuse me. 

Sir Patrick. Dont mention it, maam. \^He goes 
out]. 

B. B. Now, Mrs Dubedat, if I am to take the pa- 
tient in hand — 

Mrs Dubedat [aprehensively, with a glance at 
Ridgeon] You! But I thought that Sir Colenso — 

B. B. [beaming with the conviction that he is giving 
her a most gratifying surprise] My dear lady, your 
husband shall have ^le, 

Mrs Dubedat. But — 

B. B. Not a word: it is a pleasure to me, for your 
sake. Sir Colenso Ridgeon will be in his proper place, 
in the bacteriological laboratory. I shall be in my proper 
place, at the bedside. Your husband shall be treated 
exactly as if he were a member of the royal family. 
[Mrs Dubedat uneasy, again is about to protest]. No 
gratitude: it would embarrass me, I assure you. Now, 
may I ask whether you are particularly tied to these 
apartments. Of course, the motor has annihilated dis- 
tance; but I confess that if you were rather nearer to 
me, it would be a little more convenient. 

Mrs Dubedat. You see, this studio and flat are self- 
contained. I have suffered so much in lodgings. The 
servants are so frightfully dishonest. 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 83 

B. B. Ah ! Are thej' ? Are they ? Dear me ! 

Mrs Dubedat. I was never accustomed to lock things 
lip. And I missed so many small sums. At last a dread- 
ful thing happened. I missed a five-pound note. It was 
traced to the housemaid; and she actually said Louis had 
given it to her. And he wouldnt let me do anything: he 
is so sensitive that these things drive him mad. 

B. B. Ah — hm — ha — yes — say no more, Mrs. Dube- 
dat: you shall not move. If the moimtain will not come 
to Mahomet, Mahomet must come to the mountain. Now 
I must be off. I will write and make an appointment. 
We shall begin stimulating the phagocytes on — on — 
probably on Tuesday next; but I will let you know. 
Depend on me; dont fret; eat regularly; sleep well; 
keep your spirits up; keep the patient cheerful; hope 
for the best; no tonic like a charming woman; no medi- 
cine like cheerfulness ; no resource like science ; good- 
bye, good-bye, good-bye. [Having shaken hands — she 
being too overwhelmed to speak — he goes out, stop- 
ping to say to Ridgeon] On Tuesday morning send 
me down a tube of some really stiff anti-toxin. Any 
kind will do. Dont forget. Good-bye, Colly. [He goes 
out]. 

Ridgeon. You look quite discouraged again. [She 
is almost in tears]. What's the matter.'' Are you dis- 
appointed ? 

Mrs Dubedat. I know I ought to be very grateful. 
Believe me, I am very grateful. But — but — 

Ridgeon. Well.^ 

Mrs Dubedat. I had set my heart on your curing 
Louis. 

Ridgeon. Well, Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington — 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, I know, I know. It is a great 
privilege to have him. But oh, I wish it had been you. 
I know it's unreasonable; I cant explain; but I had such 
a strong instinct that you would cure him. I dont — I 



84 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

cant feel the same about Sir Ralph. You promised me. 
Why did you give Louis up? 

RiDGEON. I explained to you. I cannot take another 
case. 

Mrs Dubedat. But at Richmond? 

RiDGEON. At Richmond I thought I could make room 
for one more case. But my old friend Dr Blenkinsop 
claimed that place. His lung is attacked. 

Mrs Dubedat [attaching no importance whatever to 
Blenkinsop] Do you mean that elderly man — that rather 
silly — 

RiDGEON [sternly] I mean the gentleman that dined 
with us: an excellent and honest man, whose life is as 
valuable as anyone else's. I have arranged that I shall 
take his case, and that Sir Ralph Bloomfield Bonington 
shall take Mr Dubedat's. 

Mrs Dubedat [turning indignantly on him] I see 
what it is. Oh ! it is envious, mean, cruel. And I 
thought that you would be above such a thing. 

RiDGEON. What do you mean? 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, do you think I dont know? do 
you think it has never happened before? Why does 
everybody turn against him? Can you not forgive him 
for being superior to you? for being cleverer? for being 
braver? for being a great artist? 

RiDGEON. Yes: I can forgive him for all that. 

Mrs Dubedat. Well, have you anything to say 
against him? I have challenged everyone who has 
turned against him — challenged them face to face to tell 
me any wrong thing he has done, any ignoble thought 
he has uttered. They have always confessed that they 
could not tell me one. I challenge you now. What do 
you accuse him of? 

RiDGEON. I am like all the rest. Face to face, I can- 
not tell you one thing against him. 

Mrs Dudebat [not satisfied] But your manner is 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 85 

changed. And you have broken your promise to me to 
make room for him as your patient. 

RiDGEON. I think you are a little unreasonable. You 
have had the very best medical advice in London for 
him; and his case has been taken in hand by a leader 
of the profession. Surely — 

Mrs Dudebat. Oh, it is so cruel to keep telling me 
that. It seems all right; and it puts me in the wrong. 
But I am not in the wrong. I have faith in you; and I 
have no faith in the others. We have seen so many doc- 
tors : I have come to know at last when they are only 
talking and can do nothing. It is different with you. 
I feel that you know. You must listen to me, doctor. 
[With sudden misgiving] Am I offending you by call- 
ing you doctor instead of remembering your title? 

RiDGEON. Nonsense. lama doctor. But mind you, 
dont call Walpole one. 

Mrs Dudebat. I dont care about Mr Walpole: it is 
you who must befriend me. Oh, will you please sit down 
and listen to me just for a few minutes. [He assents 
with a grave inclination, and sits on the sofa. She sits 
on the easel chair] Thank you. I wont keep you long; 
but I must tell you the whole truth. Listen. I know 
Louis as nobody else in the world knows him or ever 
can know him. I am his wife. I know he has little 
faults: impatiences, sensitivenesses, even little selfish- 
nesses that are too trivial for him to notice. I know that 
he sometimes shocks people about money because he is 
so utterly above it, and cant understand the value or- 
dinary people set on it. Tell me: did he — did he bor- 
row any money from you? 

RiDGEON. He asked me for some — once. 

Mrs Dudebat [tears again in her eyes] Oh, I am 
so sorry — so sorry. But he will never do it again: I 
pledge you my word for that. He has given me his 
promise: here in this room just before you came; and 



86 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

he is incapable of breaking his word. That was his 
only real weakness; and now it is conquered and done 
with for ever. 

RiDGEON. Was that really his only weakness? 

Mrs Dudebat. He is perhaps sometimes weak about 
women, because they adore him so, and are always laying 
traps for him. And of course when he says he doesnt 
believe in morality, ordinary pious people think he must 
be wicked. You can understand, cant you, how all this 
starts a great deal of gossip about him, and gets repeated 
until even good friends get set against him.'' 

RiDGEON. Yes : I understand. 

Mrs Dudebat. Oh, if you only knew the other side 
of him as I do ! Do you know, doctor, that if Louis dis- 
honored himself by a really bad action, I should kill 
myself. 

RiDGEON. Come ! dont exaggerate. 

Mrs Dubedat. I should. You don't understand 
that, you east country people. 

RiDGEON. You did not see much of the world in 
Cornwall, did you? 

Mrs Dudebat [naively] Oh yes. I saw a great 
deal every day of the beauty of the world — more than 
you ever see here in London. But I saw very few peo- 
ple, if that is what you mean. I was an only child. 

RiDGEON. That explains a good deal. 

Mrs Dubedat. I had a great many dreams; but at 
last they all came to one dream. 

RiDGEON [with half a sigh] Yes, the usual dream. 

Mrs Dubedat [surprised] Is it usual? 

RiDGEON. As I guess. You havnt yet told me what 
it was. 

Mrs Dubedat. I didn't want to waste myself. I 
could do nothing myself; but I had a little property and 
I could help with it. I had even a little beauty: dont 
think me vain for knowing it. I knew that men of genius 



Act III The Doctor's Dilemma 87 

always had a terrible struggle with poverty and neglect 
at first. My dream was to save one of them from that, 
and bring some charm and happiness into his life. I 
prayed Heaven to send me one. I firmly believe that 
Louis was guided to me in answer to my prayer. He was 
no more like the other men I had met than the Thames 
Embankment is like our Cornish coasts. He saw every- 
thing that I saw, and drew it for me. He understood 
everything. He came to me like a child. Only fancy, 
doctor: he never even wanted to marry me: he never 
thought of the things other men think of ! I had to 
propose it myself. Then he said he had no money. 
When I told him I had some, he said " Oh, all right," 
just like a boy. He is still like that, quite unspoiled, a 
man in his thoughts, a great poet and artist in his 
dreams, and a child in his ways. I gave him myself and 
all I had that he might grow to his full height with 
plenty of sunshine. H I lost faith in him, it would 
mean the wreck and failure of my life. I should go back 
to Cornwall and die. I could show you the very cliff I 
should jump off. You must cure him: you must make 
him quite well again for me. I know that you can do 
it and that nobody else can. I implore you not to refuse 
what I am going to ask you to do. Take Louis yourself; 
and let Sir Ralph cure Dr Blenkinsop. 

RiDGEON [slowly] Mrs Dubedat: do you really be- 
lieve in my knowledge and skill as you say you do? 

Mrs Dubedat. Absolutely. I do not give my trust 
by halves. 

RiDGEON. I know that. Well, I am going to test you 
— hard. Will you believe me when I tell you that I 
understand what you have just told me; that I have no 
desire but to serve you in the most faithful friendship; 
and that your hero must be preserved to you. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh forgive me. Forgive what I said. 
You will preserve him to me. 



88 The Doctor's Dilemma Act III 

RiDGEON. At all hazards. [She kisses his hand. He 
rises hastily]. No; you have not heard the rest. [She 
rises too]. You must believe me when I tell you that 
the one chance of preserving the hero lies in Louis being 
in the care of Sir Ralph. 

Mrs Dubedat [firmly] You say so: I have no more 
doubt: I believe you. Thank you. 

RiDGEON. Good-bye. [She takes his hand], I hope 
this will be a lasting friendship. 

Mrs Dubedat. It will. My friendships end only 
with death. 

RiDGEON. Death ends everything, doesnt it.'' Good- 
bye. 

With a sigh and a look of pity at her which she does 
not understand, he goes. 



ACT IV 

The studio. The easel is pushed back to the wall. 
Cardinal Deaths holding his scythe and hour-glass like 
a sceptre and globe, sits on the throne. On the hat-stand 
hang the hats of Sir Patrick and Bloomfeld Bonington. 
Walpole, just come in, is hanging up his beside them. 
There is a knock. He opens the door and finds Ridg- 
eon there. 

Walpole. Hallo, Ridgeon ! 

They come into the middle of the room tjgether, tak- 
ing off their gloves. 

Ridgeon. Whats the matter ! Have you been sent 
for, too? 

Walpole. Weve all been sent for. Ive only just 
come: I havnt seen him yet. The charwoman says that 
old Paddy Cullen has been here with B. B. for the last 
half-hour. [*Szr Patrick, with bad news in his face, en- 
ters from the inner room]. Well: whats up? 

Sir Patrick, Go in and see. B. B. is in there with 
him. 

Walpole goes. Ridgeon is about to follow him; but 
Sir Patrick stops him with a look. 

Ridgeon. What has happened? 

Sir Patrick. Do you remember Jane Marsh's arm? 

Ridgeon. Is that whats happened? 

Sir Patrick. Thats whats happened. His lung has 
89 



90 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

gone like Jane's arm. I never saw such a case. He has 
got through three months galloping consumption in three 
days. 

RiDGEON. B. B. got in on the negative phase. 

Sir Patrick. Negative or positive, the lad's done 
for. He wont last out the afternoon. He'll go suddenly: 
Ive often seen it. 

RiDGEON. So long as he goes before his wife finds 
him out, / dont care. I fully expected this. 

Sir Patrick [drily] It's a little hard on a lad to be 
killed because his wife has too high an opinion of him. 
Fortunately few of us are in any danger of that. 

Sir Ralph comes from the inner room and hastens be- 
tween them, humanely concerned, but professionally elate 
and communicative. 

B. B. Ah, here you are, Ridgeon. Paddy's told you, 
of course. 

Ridgeon. Yes. 

B. B. It's an enormously interesting case. You 
know. Colly, by Jupiter, if I didnt know as a matter of 
scientific fact that I'd been stimulating the phagocytes, 
I should say I'd been stimulating the other things. 
What is the explanation of it. Sir Patrick? How do 
you account for it, Ridgeon? Have we over-stimulated 
the phagocytes ? Have they not only eaten up the bacilli, 
but attacked and destroyed the red corpuscles as well? a 
possibility suggested by the patient's pallor. Nay, have 
they finally begun to prey on the lungs themselves? Or 
on one another? I shall write a paper about this case. 

Walpole comes bach, very serious, even shocked. He 
comes between B. B. and Ridgeon. 

Walpole. Whew! B. B.: youve done it this time. 

B. B. What do you mean ? 

Walpole. Killed him. The worst case of neglected 
blood-poisoning I ever saw. It's too late now to do any- 
thing. He'd die under the anaesthetic. 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 91 

B. B. [offetided] Killed! Really, Walpole, if your 
monomania were not well known, I should take such an 
expression very seriously. 

Sir Patrick. Come come ! When youve both killed 
as many people as I have in my time youll feel humble 
enough about it. Come and look at him, Colly. 

Ridgeon and Sir Patrick go into the inner room. 

Walpole. I apologize, B. B. But it's blood-poison- 
ing- 

B. B. [recovering his irresistible good nature] My 
dear Walpole, everything is blood-poisoning. But 
upon my soul, I shall not use any of that stuff of Ridg- 
eon's again. What made me so sensitive about what you 
said just now is that, strictly between ourselves, Ridgeon 
has cooked our young friend's goose. 

Jennifer, worried and distressed, but always gentle, 
comes between them, from the inner room. She wears a 
nurse's apron. 

Mrs Dubedat. Sir Ralph: what am I to do? That 
man who insisted on seeing me, and sent in word that 
his business was important to Louis, is a newspaper man. 
A paragraph appeared in the paper this morning saying 
that Louis is seriously ill ; and this man wants to interview 
him about it. How can people be so brutally callous? 

Walpole [moving vengefully towards the door] You 
just leave me to deal with him ! 

Mrs Dubedat [stopping him] But Louis insists on 
seeing him: he almost began to cry about it. And he 
says he cant bear his room any longer. He says he 
wants to [she struggles with a sob] — to die in his studio. 
Sir Patrick says let him have his way: it can do 
no harm. What shall we do? 

B. B. [encouragingly] Why, follow Sir Patrick's 
excellent advice, of course. As he says, it can do him 
no harm ; and it will no doubt do him good — a great deal 
of good. He will be much the better for it. 



92 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

Mrs Dubedat [a little cheered] Will you bring the 
man up here, Mr Walpole, and tell him that he may see 
Louis, but that he mustnt exhaust him by talking? 
[Walpole nods and goes out by the outer door]. Sir 
Ralph, dont be angry with me; but Louis will die if 
he stays here. I must take him to Cornwall. He will 
recover there. 

B. B. [brightening wonderfully, as if Dubedat were 
already saved] Cornwall! The very place for him! 
Wonderful for the lungs. Stupid of me not to think of 
it before. You are his best physician after all, dear lady. 
An inspiration ! Cornwall : of course, yes, yes, yes. 

Mrs Dubedat [comforted and touched] You are so 
kind. Sir Ralph. But dont give me much or I shall 
cry; and Louis cant bear that. 

B. B. [gently putting his protecting arm round her 
shoulders] Then let us come back to him and help to 
carry him in. Cornwall ! of course, of course. The very 
thing! [They go together into the bedroom]. 

Walpole returns with The Newspaper Man, a cheerful, 
affable young man who is disabled for ordinary business 
pursuits by a congenital erroneousness which renders him 
incapable of describing accurately anything he sees, or un- 
derstanding or reporting accurately anything he hears. As 
the only employment in which these defects do not mat- 
ter is journalism {for a newspaper, not having to act on 
its description and reports, but only to sell them to idly 
curious people, has nothing but honor to lose by inac- 
curacy and unveracity) , he has perforce become a jour- 
nalist, and has to keep up an air of high spirits through 
a daily struggle with his own illiteracy and the precari- 
ousness of his employment. He has a note-book, and 
ocasionally attempts to make a note; but as he cannot 
write shorthand, and does not write with ease in any 
hand, he generally gives it up as a bad job before he 
succeeds in finishing a sentence. 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 93 

The Newspaper Man [^looking round and making in- 
decisive attempts at notesi This is the studio, I 
suppose. 

Walpole. Yes. 

The Newspaper Man [^wittily^ Where he has his 
models, eh.^" 

Walpole [grimly irresponsive^ No doubt. 

The Newspaper Man. Cubicle, you said it was.^ 

Walpole. Yes, tubercle. 

The Newspaper Man. Which way do you spell it: 
is it c-u-b-i-c-a-1 or c-l-e? 

Walpole. Tubercle, man, not cubical. [^Spelling it 
for him^ T-u-b-e-r-c-1-e. 

The Newspaper Man. Oh ! tubercle. Some disease, 
I suppose. I thought he had consumption. Are you one 
of the family or the doctor.'' 

Walpole. I'm neither one nor the other. I am 
Mister Cutler Walpole. Put that down. Then put 
down Sir Colenso Ridgeon. 

The Newspaper Man. Pigeon? 

Walpole. Ridgeon. {^Contemptuously snatching his 
book] Here: youd better let me write the names down 
for you: youre sure to get them wrong. That comes of 
belonging to an illiterate profession, with no qualifica- 
tions and no public register. {He writes the particu- 
lars]. 

The Newspaper Man. Oh, I say: you have got 
your knife into us, havnt you? 

Walpole {vindictively] I wish I had: I'd make a 
better man of you. Now attend. {Sherving him the 
hook] These are the names of the three doctors. This 
is the patient. This is the address. This is the name 
of the disease. {He shuts the book with a snap which 
makes the journalist blink, and returns it to him]. Mr 
Dubedat will be brought in here presently. He wants 
to see you because he doesnt know how bad he is. We'll 



94 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

allow you to wait a few minutes to humor him ; but if 
you talk to him, out you go. He may die at any mo- 
ment. 

The Newspaper Man [interested] Is he as bad as 
that? I say: I am in luck to-day. Would you mind let- 
ting me photograph you? [He produces a camera]. 
Could you have a lancet or something in your hand? 

Walpole. Put it up. If you want my photograph 
you can get it in Baker Street in any of the series of 
celebrities. 

The Newspaper Man. But theyll want to be paid. 
If you wouldnt mind [fingering the camera] — ? 

Walpole. I would. Put it up, I tell you. Sit down 
there and be quiet. 

The Newspaper Man quickly sits dorvn on the piano 
stool as Dubedat, in an invalid's chair, is wheeled in hy 
Mrs Dubedat and Sir Ralph. They place the chair be- 
tween the dais and the sofa, where the easel stood before. 
Louis is not changed as a robust man would be; and he 
is not scared. His eyes look larger; and he is so weak 
physically that he can hardly move, lying on his cushions 
with complete languor; but his mind is active; it is mak- 
ing the most of his condition, finding voluptuousness in 
languor and drama in death. They are all impressed, in 
spite of themselves, except Ridgeon, who is implacable. 
B. B. is entirely sympathetic and forgiving. Ridgeon 
follows the chair with a tray of milk and stimulants. Sir 
Patrick, who accompanies him, takes the tea-table from 
the corner and places it behind the chair for the tray. 
B. B. takes the easel chair and places it for Jennifer at 
Dubedat's side, next the dais, from which the lay figure 
ogles the dying artist. B. B. then returns to Dubedat's 
left. Jennifer sits. Walpole sits down on the edge of 
the dais. Ridgeon stands near him. 

Louis [blissfully] Thats happiness. To be in a 
studio ! Hapiness ! 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 95 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes^ dear. Sir Patrick says you may 
stay here as long as you like, 

Louis. Jennifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, my darling. 

Louis. Is the newspaper man here? 

The Newspaper Man [glibly] Yes, Mr Dubedat: 
I'm here, at your service. I represent the press. I 
thought you might like to let us have a few words about 
— about — er — well, a few words on your illness, and 
your plans for the season. 

Louis. My plans for the season are very simple. I'm 
going to die. 

Mrs Dubedat [tortured] Louis — dearest — 

Louis. My darling: I'm very weak and tired. Dont 
put on me the horrible strain of pretending that I dont 
know. Ive been lying there listening to the doctors — 
laughing to myself. They know. Dearest: dont cry. 
It makes you ugly; and I cant bear that. [She dries her 
eyes and recovers herself with a proud effort]. I want 
you to promise me something. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, yes: you know I will. [Im- 
ploringly] Only, my love, my love, dont talk: it will 
waste your strength. 

Louis. No : it will only use it up. Ridgeon : give me 
something to keep me going for a few minutes — not one 
of your confounded anti-toxins, if you dont mind. I 
have some things to say before I go. 

RiDGEON [looking at Sir Patrick] I suppose it can 
do no harm.'' [He pours out some spirit, and is about to 
add soda water when Sir Patrick corrects him]. 

Sir Patrick. In milk. Dont set him coughing. 

Louis [after drinking] Jennifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, dear. 

Louis. If theres one thing I hate more than another, 
it's a widow. Promise me that youll never be a widow. 

Mrs Dubedat. My dear, what do you mean.'' 



96 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

Louis. I want you to look beautiful. I want people 
to see in your eyes that you were married to me. The 
people in Italy used to point at Dante and say " There 
goes the man who has been in hell." I want them to 
point at you and say " There goes a woman who has been 
in heaven." It has been heaven, darling, hasnt it — some- 
times ? 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh yes, yes. Always, always. 

Louis. If you wear black and cry, people will say 
" Look at that miserable woman : her husband made her 
miserable." 

Mrs Dubedat. No, never. You are the light and 
the blessing of my life. I never lived until I knew you. 

Louis [his eyes glistening] Then you must always 
wear beautiful dresses and splendid magic jewels. 
Think of all the wonderful pictures I shall never paint. 
[She wins a terrible victory over a sob] Well, you must 
be transfigured with all the beauty of those pictures. 
Men must get such dreams from seeing you as they never 
could get from any daubing with paints and brushes. 
Painters must paint you as they never painted any mor- 
tal woman before. There must be a great tradition of 
beauty, a great atmosphere of wonder and romance. 
That is what men must always think of when they think 
of me. That is the sort of immortality I want. You can 
make that for me, Jennifer. There are lots of things 
you dont understand that every woman in the street un- 
derstands; but you can understand that and do it as 
nobody else can. Promise me that immortality. Prom- 
ise me you will not make a little hell of crape and cry- 
ing and undertaker's horrors and withering flowers and 
all that vulgar rubbish. 

Mrs Dubedat. I promise. But all that is far off, 
dear. You are to come to Cornwall with me and get well. 
Sir Ralph says so. 

Louis. Poor old B. B. 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 97 

B. B. [affected to tears, turns away and whispers to 
Sir Patrick] Poor fellow! Brain going. 

Louis. Sir Patrick's there, isn't he.'' 

Sir Patrick. Yes, yes. I'm here. 

Louis. Sit down, wont you.'' It's a shame to keep 
you standing about. 

Sir Patrick. Yes, yes. Thank you. All right. 

Louis. Jennifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, dear. 

Louis [with a strange look of delight] Do you re- 
member the burning bush? 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, yes. Oh, my dear, how it 
strains my heart to remember it now ! 

Louis. Does it.'' It fills me with joy. Tell them 
about it. 

Mrs Dubedat. It was nothing — only that once in 
my old Cornish home we lit the first fire of the winter; 
and when we looked through the window we saw the 
flames dancing in a bush in the garden. 

Louis. Such a color ! Garnet color. Waving like 
silk. Liquid lovely flame flowing up through the bay 
leaves, and not burning them. Well, I shall be a flame 
like that. I'm sorry to disappoint the poor little worms; 
but the last of me shall be the flame in the burning bush. 
Whenever you see the flame, Jennifer, that will be me. 
Promise me that I shall be burnt. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, if I might be with you, Louis ! 

Louis. No: you must always be in the garden when 
the bush flames. You are my hold on the world: you 
are my immortality. Promise. 

Mrs Dubedat. I'm listening. I shall not forget. 
You know that I promise. 

Louis. Well, thats about all; except that you are to 
hang my pictures at the one-man show. I can trust your 
eye. You wont let anyone else touch them. 

Mrs Dubedat. You can trust me. 



98 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

Louis. Then theres nothing more to worry about, is 
there? Give me some more of that milk. I'm fearfully- 
tired; but if I stop talking I shant begin again. [Sir 
Ralph gives him a drink. He takes it and looks up 
quaintly], I say, B. B., do you think anything would 
stop you talking.'' 

B. B. [almost unmanned] He confuses me with you, 
Paddy. Poor fellow ! Poor fellow ! 

Louis [musing] I used to be awfully afraid of death; 
but now it's come I have no fear; and I'm perfectly 
happy. Jennifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Yes, dear.'' 

Louis. I'll tell you a secret. I used to think that 
our marriage was all an affectation, and that I'd break 
loose and run away some day. But now that I'm going 
to be broken loose whether I like it or not, I'm perfectly 
fond of you, and perfectly satisfied because I'm going 
to live as part of you and not as my troublesome self. 

Mrs Dubedat [heartbroken] Stay with me, Louis. 
Oh, dont leave me, dearest. 

Louis. Not that I'm selfish. With all my faults I 
dont think Ive ever been really selfish. No artist can: 
Art is too large for that. You will marry again, Jen- 
nifer. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, how can you, Louis? 

Louis [insisting childishly] Yes, because people who 
have found marriage happy always marry again. Ah, 
I shant be jealous. [Slyly.] But dont talk to the other 
fellow too much about me: he wont like it. [Almost 
chuckling] I shall be your lover all the time; but it 
will be a secret from him, poor devil ! 

Sir Patrick. Come ! youve talked enough. Try to 
rest awhile. 

Louis [wearily] Yes: I'm fearfully tired; but I shall 
have a long rest presently. I have something to say to 
you fellows. Youre all there, arnt you? I'm too weak 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 99 

to see anything but Jennifer's bosom. That promises 
rest. 

RiDGEoN. We are all here. 

Louis [startled] That voice sounded devilish. Take 
care, Ridgeon : my ears hear things that other people's 
ears cant. Ive been thinking — thinking. I'm cleverer 
than you imagine. 

Sir Patrick [whispering to Ridgeon] Youve got on 
his nerves. Colly. Slip out quietly. 

Ridgeon [apart to Sir Patrick] Would you deprive 
the dying actor of his audience.'' 

Louis [his face lighting up faintly with mischievous 
glee] I heard that, Ridgeon. That was good. Jen- 
nifer, dear: be kind to Ridgeon always; because he was 
the last man who amused me. 

Ridgeon [relentless] Was I.'' 

Louis. But it's not true. It's you who are still on 
the stage. I'm half way home already. 

Mrs Dubedat [to Ridgeon] What did you say.-* 

Louis [answering for him] Nothing, dear. Only one 
of those little secrets that men keep among themselves. 
Well, all you chaps have thought pretty hard things of 
me, and said them. 

B. B. [quite overcome] No, no, Dubedat. Not at 
all. 

Louis. Yes, you have. I know what you all 
think of me. Dont imagine I'm sore about it. I for- 
give you. 

Walpole [involuntarily] Well, damn me ! [Ashamed] 
I beg your pardon. 

Louis. "That was old Walpole, I know. Don't grieve, 
Walpole. I'm perfectly happy. I'm not in pain. I 
dont want to live. Ive escaped from myself. I'm in 
heaven, immortal in the heart of my beautiful Jennifer. 
I'm not afraid, and not ashamed. [Reflectively, puz- 
zling it out for himself weakly] I know that in an ac- 



100 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

cidental sort of way, struggling through the unreal part 
of life, I havnt always been able to live up to my ideal. 
But in my own real world I have never done anything 
wrong, never denied my faith, never been imtrue to my- 
self. Ive been threatened and blackmailed and insulted 
and starved. But Ive played the game, Ive fought the 
good fight. And now it's all over, theres an indescribable 
peace. [He feebly folds his hands and utters his creed] 
I believe in Michael Angelo, Velasquez, and Rembrandt; 
in the might of design, the mystery of color, the redemp- 
tion of all things by Beauty everlasting, and the message 
of Art that has made these hands blessed. Amen. Amen, 
[i/e closes his eyes and lies still]. 

Mrs Dubedat [breathless] Louis: are you — 

Walpole rises and comes quickly to see rvhether he is 
dead. 

Louis. Not yet, dear. Very nearly, but not yet. I 
should like to rest my head on your bosom; only it would 
tire you. 

Mrs Dubedat. No, no, no, darling: how could 
you tire me? [She lifts him so that he lies on her 
bosom]. 

Louis. Thats good. Thats real. 

Mrs Dubedat. Dont spare me, dear. Indeed, in- 
deed you will not tire me. Lean on me with all your 
weight. 

Louis [with a sudden half return of his normal strength 
and comfort] Jinny Gwinny: I think I shall recover 
after all. [Sir Patrick looks significantly at Ridgeon, 
mutely warning him that this is the end]. 

Mrs Dubedat [hopefully] Yes, yes: you shall. 

Louis. Because I suddenly want to sleep. Just an 
ordinary sleep. 

Mrs Dubedat [rocking him] Yes, dear. Sleep. 
[He seems to go to sleep. Walpole makes another move- 
ment. She protests]. Sh-sh: please dont disturb him. 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 101 

[His lips move]. What did you say, dear? [In great 
distress] I cant listen without moving him. [His lips 
move again: Walpole bends down and listens]. 

Walpole. He wants to know is the newspaper man 
here. 

The Newspaper Man [excited; for he has been en- 
joying himself enormously] Yes, Mr Dubedat. Here 
I am. 

Walpole raises his hand rvarningly to silence him. Sir 
Ralph sits down quietly on the sofa and frankly buries 
his face in his handkerchief. 

Mrs Dubedat [with great relief] Oh thats right, 
dear: dont spare me: lean with all your weight on me. 
Now you are really resting. 

Sir Patrick quickly comes forward and feels Louis's 
pulse; then takes him by the shoulders. 

Sir Patrick. Let me put him back on the pillow, 
maam. He will be better so. 

Mrs Dubedat [piteously] Oh no, please, please, 
doctor. He is not tiring me ; and he will be so hurt when 
he wakes if he finds I have put him away. 

Sir Patrick. He will never wake again. [He takes 
the body from her and replaces it in the chair. Ridg- 
eon, unmoved, lets down the back and makes a bier 
of it]. 

Mrs Dubedat [who has unexpectedly sprung to her 
feet, and stands dry-eyed and stately] Was that death? 

Walpole. Yes. 

Mrs Dubedat [with complete digvity] Will you wait 
for me a moment? I will come back. [She goes out]. 

Walpole. Ought we to follow her? Is she in her 
right senses? 

Sir Patrick [with quiet cotiviction] . Yes. Shes all 
right. Leave her alone. She'll come back. 

Ridgeon [callously] Let us get this thing out of the 
way before she comes. 



102 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

B. B. [rising, shocked] My dear Colly! The poor 
lad! He died splendidly. 

Sir Patrick. Aye ! that is how the wicked die. 

For there are no bands in their death; 

But their strength is firm: 

They are not in trouble as other men. 

No matter: it's not for us to judge. He's in another 
world now. 

Walpole. Borrowing his first five-pound note there, 
probably. 

RiDGEON. I said the other day that the most tragic 
thing in the world is a sick doctor. I was wrong. 
The most tragic thing in the world is a man of genius 
who is not also a man of honor. 

Ridgeon and Walpole wheel the chair into the recess. 

The Newspaper Man [to Sir Ralph] I thought it 
shewed a very nice feeling, his being so particular about 
his wife going into proper mourning for him and mak- 
ing her promise never to marry again. 

B. B. [impressively] Mrs Dubedat is not in a posi- 
tion to carry the interview any further. Neither 
are we. 

Sir Patrick. Good afternoon to you. 

The Newspaper Man. Mrs. Dubedat said she was 
coming back. 

B. B. After you have gone. 

The Newspaper Man. Do you think she would give 
me a few words on How It Feels to be a Widow? 
Rather a good title for an article, isnt it? 

B. B. Young man: if you wait until Mrs Dubedat 
comes back, you will be able to write an article on How 
It Feels to be Turned Out of the House. 

The Newspaper Man [unconvinced] You think 
she'd rather not — 

B. B. [cutting him short] Good day to you. [Giving 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 103 

him a visiting-card] Mind you get my name correctly. 
Good day. 

The Newspaper Man. Good day. Thank you. 
[Vaguely trying to read the card] Mr — 

B. B. No, not Mister. This is your hat, I think 
[giving it to him]. Gloves? No, of course: no gloves. 
Good day to you. [He edges him out at last; shuts the 
door on him; and returns to Sir Patrick as Ridgeon and 
Walpole come back from the recess, Walpole crossing 
the room to the hat-stand, and Ridgeon coming between 
Sir Ralph and Sir Patrick], Poor fellow! Poor young 
fellow ! How well he died ! I fee] a better man, really. 

Sir Patrick. When youre as old as I am, youll know 
that it matters very little how a man dies. What matters 
is, how he lives. Every fool that runs his nose against 
a bullet is a hero nowadays, because he dies for his 
country. Why dont he live for it to some purpose.'' 

B. B. No, please, Paddy: dont be hard on the poor 
lad. Not now, not now. After all, was he so bad? He 
had only two failings: money and women. Well, let us 
be honest. Tell the truth, Paddy. Dont be hypocritical, 
Ridgeon. Throw off the mask, Walpole. Are these 
two matters so well arranged at present that a disregard 
of the usual arrangements indicates real depravity? 

Walpole. I dont mind his disregarding the usual 
arrangements. Confound the usual arrangements ! To a 
man of science theyre beneath contempt both as to money 
and women. What I mind is his disregarding every- 
thing except his own pocket and his own fancy. He 
didnt disregard the usual arrangements when they paid 
him. Did he give us his pictures for nothing? Do you 
suppose he'd have hesitated to blackmail me if I'd com- 
promised myself with his wife? Not he. 

Sir Patrick. Dont waste your time wrangling over 
him. A blackguard's a blackguard; an honest man's an 
honest man; and neither of them will ever be at a loss 



104 The Doctor's Dilemma Act IV 

for a religion or a morality to prove that their ways are 
the right ways. It's the same with nations^ the same 
with professions, the same all the world over and always 
will be. 

B. B. Ah, well, perhaps, perhaps, perhaps. Still, 
de mortuis nil nisi bonum. He died extremely well, 
remarkably well. He has set us an example: let us en- 
deavor to follow it rather than harp on the weaknesses 
that have perished with him. I think it is Shakespear 
who says that the good that most men do lives after 
them: the evil lies interred with their bones. Yes: in- 
terred with their bones. Believe me, Paddy, we are all 
mortal. It is the common lot, Ridgeon. Say what you 
will, Walpole, Nature's debt must be paid. If tis not 
to-day, twill be to-morrow. 

To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow 

After life's fitful fever they sleep well 

And like this insubstantial bourne from which 

No traveller returns 

Leave not a wrack behind. 

Walpole is about to speak, but B. B., suddenly and 
vehemently proceeding, extinguishes him. 

Out, out, brief candle: 
For nothing canst thou to damnation add 
The readiness is all. 

Walpole [gently; for B. B.'s feeling, absurdly ex- 
pressed as it is, is too sincere and humane to be ridi- 
culed] Yes, B. B. Death makes people go on like that. 
I dont know why it should; but it does. By the way, 
what are we going to do? Ought we to clear out; or 
had we better wait and see whether Mrs Dubedat will 
come back? 

Sir Patrick. I think we'd better go. We can tell 
the charwoman what to do. 



Not at all, not at all. 
By no means. 
It doesnt matter in the 
least. 



Act IV The Doctor's Dilemma 105 

They take their hats and go to the door. 

Mrs Dubedat [coming from the inner door rvonder- 
fully and beautifully dressed, and radiant, carrying a 
great piece of purple silk, handsomely embroidered, over 
her arm] I'm so sorry to have kept you waiting. 

"1 fDont mention it, madam. 

Sir Patrick [amazed, all 

B. B. L together iA^ 

RiDGEON a confused 

Walpole murmur] 

Mrs Dubedat [coming to them] I felt that I must 
shake hands with his friends once before we part to-day. 
We have shared together a great privilege and a great 
happiness. I dont think we can ever think of ourselves 
as ordinary people again. We have had a wonderful ex- 
perience; and that gives us a common faith, a common 
ideal, that nobody else can quite have. Life will always 
be beautiful to us : death will always be beautiful to us. 
May we shake hands on that? 

Sir Patrick [shaking hands] Remember: all letters 
had better be left to your solicitor. Let him open every- 
thing and settle everything. Thats the law, you know. 

Mrs Dubedat. Oh, thank you: I didnt know. [Sir 
Patrick goes]. 

Walpole. Good-bye. I blame myself: I should have 
insisted on operating. [He goes]. 

B. B. I will send the proper people: they will know 
what to do: you shall have no trouble. Good-bye, my 
dear lady. [^He goes]. 

RiDGEON. Good-bye. [He offers his hand]. 

Mrs Dubedat [drawing back with gentle majesty] I 
said his friends. Sir Colenso. [He bows and goes]. 

She unfolds the great piece of silk, and goes into the 
recess to cover her dead. 



ACT V 

One of the smaller Bond Street Picture Galleries. 
The entrance is from a picture shop. Nearly in the mid- 
dle of the gallery there is a writing-table, at which the 
Secretary, fashionably dressed, sits with his back to the 
entrance, correcting catalogue proofs. Some copies of a 
new book are on the desk, also the Secretary's shining 
hat and a couple of magnifying glasses. At the side, on 
his left, a little behind him, is a small door marked Pri- 
vate. Near the same side is a cushioned bench parallel 
to the walls, which are covered with Dubedat's works. 
Two screens, also covered with drawings, stand near the 
corners right and left of the entrance. 

Jennifer, beautifully dressed and apparently very 
happy and prosperous, comes into the gallery through 
the private door. 

Jennifer. Have the catalogues come yet, Mr 
Danby ? 

The Secretary, Not yet. 

Jennifer. What a shame! It's a quarter past: the 
private view will begin in less than half an hour. 

The Secretary. I think I'd better run over to the 
printers to hurry them up. 

Jennifer. Oh, if you would be so good, Mr Danby. 
I'll take your place while youre away. 

The Secretary. If anyone should come before the 
time dont take any notice. The commissionaire wont let 
anyone through unless he knows him. We have a few 
people who like to come before the crowd — people who 
really buy; and of course we're glad to see them. Have 

106 



Act V The Doctor's Dilemma 107 

you seen the notices in Brush and Crayon and in The 
Easel ? 

Jennifer [indignantly] Yes: most disgraceful. They 
write quite patronizingly, as if they were Mr Dubedat's 
superiors. After all the cigars and sandwiches they had 
from us on the press day, and all they drank, I really 
think it is infamous that they should write like that. I 
hope you have not sent them tickets for to-day. 

The Secretary. Oh, they wont come again: theres 
no lunch to-day. The advance copies of your book have 
come. [He indicates the new hoohs\. 

Jennifer [pouncing on a copy, wildly excited] Give 
it to me. Oh ! excuse me a moment [she runs away with 
it through the private door] . 

The Secretary takes a mirror from his drawer and 
smartens himself before going out. Ridgeon comes in. 

Ridgeon. Good morning. May I look round, as 
usual, before the doors open.'' 

The Secretary. Certainly, Sir Colenso. I'm sorry 
the catalogues have not come: I'm just going to see about 
them. Heres my own list, if you dont mind. 

Ridgeon. Thanks. Whats this? [He takes up one 
of the new books]. 

The Secretary. Thats just come in. An advance 
copy of Mrs Dubedat's Life of her late husband. 

Ridgeon [reading the title] The Story of a King of 
Men. By His Wife. [He looks at the portrait frontis- 
piece]. Ay: there he is. You knew him here, I sup- 
pose. 

The Secretary. Oh, we knew him. Better than she 
did, Sir Colenso, in some ways, perhaps. 

Ridgeon. So did I. [They look significantly at one 
another]. I'll take a look round. 

The Secretary puts on the shining hat and goes out. 
Ridgeon begins looking at the pictures. Presently he 
comes back to the table for a magnifying glass, and scru- 
tinizes a drawing very closely. He sighs; shakes his 



108 The Doctor's Dilemma Act V 

head, as if constrained to admit the extraordinary fasci- 
nation and merit of the work; then marks the Secretary's 
list. Proceeding with his survey, he disappears behind 
the screen. Jennifer comes hack with her hook. A look 
round satisfies her that she is alone. She seats herself 
at the table and admires the memoir — her first printed 
book — to her heart's content. Ridgeon re-appears, face 
to the wall, scrutinizing the drawings. After using his 
glass again, he steps back to get a more distant view of 
one of the larger pictures. She hastily closes the book at 
the sound; looks round; recognizes him; and stares, pet- 
rified. He takes a further step hack which brings him 
nearer to her. 

Ridgeon [shaking his head as before, ejaculates] 
Clever brute ! [She flushes as though he had struck her. 
He turns to put the glass down on the desk, and finds 
himself face to face with her intent gaze], I beg your 
pardon. I thought I was alone. 

Jennifer [controlling herself, and speaking steadily 
and meaningly] I am glad we have met, Sir Colenso 
Ridgeon. I met Dr Blenkinsop yesterday. I congratu- 
late you on a wonderful cure. 

Ridgeon [can find no words: makes an embarrassed 
gesture of assent after a moment's silence, and puts down 
the glass and the Secretary's list on the table]. 

Jennifer. He looked the picture of health and 
strength and prosperity. [She looks for a moment at 
the walls, contrasting Blenkinsop's fortune with the ar- 
tist's fate]. 

Ridgeon [in low tones, still embarrassed^ He has 
been fortunate. 

Jennifer. Very fortunate. His life has been spared. 

Ridgeon. I mean that he has been made a Medical 
Officer of Health. He cured the Chairman of the Bor- 
ough Council very successfully. 

Jennifer. With your medicines.'' 



Act V The Doctor's Dilemma 109 

RiDGEON. No. I believe it was with a pound of ripe 
greengages. 

Jennifer [with deep gravity] Funny! 

RiDGEON. Yes. Life does not cease to be funny 
when people die any more than it ceases to be serious 
when people laugh. 

Jennifer. Dr Blenkinsop said one very strange 
thing to me. 

RiDGEON. What was that? 

Jennifer. He said that private practice in medicine 
ought to be put down by law. When I asked him why, 
he said that private doctors were ignorant licensed mur- 
derers. 

RiDGEON. That is what the public doctor always 
thinks of the private doctor. Well, Blenkinsop ought to 
know. He was a private doctor long enough himself. 
Come ! you have talked at me long enough. Talk to me. 
You have something to reproach me with. There is re- 
proach in your face, in your voice: you are full of it. 
Out with it. 

Jennifer. It is too late for reproaches now. When 
I turned and saw you just now, I wondered how you 
could come here coolly to look at his pictures. You an- 
swered the question. To you, he was only a clever brute. 

RiDGEON [quivering] Oh, dont. You know I did not 
know you were here. 

Jennifer [raisitig her head a little with a quite gentle 
impulse of pride] You think it only mattered because 
I heard it. As if it could touch me, or touch him ! Dont 
you see that what is really dreadful is that to you living 
things have no souls. 

RiDGEON [tvith a sceptical shrug] The soul is an 
organ I have not come across in the course of my anatom- 
ical work. 

Jennifer. You know you would not dare to say such 
a silly thing as that to anybody but a woman whose mind 



110 The Doctor's Dilemma Act V 

you despise. If you dissected me you could not find my 
conscience. Do you think I have got none? 

RiDGEON. I have met people who had none. 

Jennifer. Clever brutes? Do you know, doctor, 
that some of the dearest and most faithful friends I ever 
had were only brutes ! You would have vivisected them. 
The dearest and greatest of all my friends had a sort of 
beauty and affectionateness that only animals have. I 
hope you may never feel what I felt when I had to put 
him into the hands of men who defend the torture of ani- 
mals because they are only brutes. 

RiDGEON. Well, did you find us so very cruel, after 
all ? They tell me that though you have dropped me, you 
stay for weeks with the Bloomfield Boningtons and the 
Walpoles. I think it must be true, because they never 
mention you to me now. 

Jennifer. The animals in Sir Ralph's house are like 
spoiled children. When Mr. Walpole had to take a splin- 
ter out of the mastiff's paw, I had to hold the poor dog 
myself; and Mr Walpole had to turn Sir Ralph out of 
the room. And Mrs. Walpole has to tell the gardener 
not to kill wasps when Mr. Walpole is looking. But 
there are doctors who are naturally cruel; and there are 
others who get used to cruelty and are callous about it. 
They blind themselves to the souls of animals ; and that 
blinds them to the souls of men and women. You made 
a dreadful mistake about Louis ; but you would not have 
made it if you had not trained yourself to make the same 
mistake about dogs. You saw nothing in them but dumb 
brutes ; and so you could see nothing in him but a clever 
brute. 

RiDGEON [with sudden resolution] I made no mistake 
whatever about him. 

Jennifer. Oh, doctor ! 

RiDGEON [obstinately] I made no mistake whatever 
about him. 



Act V The Doctor's Dilemma 111 

Jennifer. Have you forgotten that he died? 

RiDGEON [with a sweep of his hand towards the pic- 
tures'] He is not dead. He is there. [^Taking up the 
hooh] And there. 

Jennifer [spriiiging up with blazing eyes] Put that 
down. How dare you touch it.f* 

Ridgeon, amazed at the fierceness of the outburst, puts 
it down with a deprecatory shrug. She takes it up and 
looks at it as of he had profaned a relic. 

Ridgeon. I am very sorry. I see I had bet- 
ter go. 

Jennifer [putting the book down] I beg your par- 
don. I — I forgot myself. But it is not yet — it is a pri- 
vate copy. 

Ridgeon. But for me it would have been a very dif- 
ferent book. 

Jennifer. But for you it would have been a longer 
one. 

Ridgeon. You know then that I killed him? 

Jennifer [suddenly moved and softened] Oh, doctor, 
if you acknowledge that — if you have confessed it to 
3"ourself — if you realize what you have done, then there 
is forgiveness. I trusted in your strength instinctively at 
first; then I thought I had mistaken callousness for 
strength. Can you blame me? But if it was really 
strength — if it was only such a mistake as we all make 
sometimes— it will make me so happy to be friends with 
you again. 

Ridgeon. I tell you I made no mistake. I cured 
Blenkinsop: was there any mistake there? 

Jennifer. He recovered. Oh, dont be foolishly 
proud, doctor. Confess to a failure, and save our friend- 
ship. Remember, Sir Ralph gave Louis your medicine; 
and it made him worse. 

Ridgeon. I cant be your friend on false pretences. 
Something has got me by the throat: the truth must come 



112 The Doctor's Dilemma Act V 

out. I used that medicine myself on Blenkinsop. It did 
no make him worse. It is a dangerous medicine : it cured 
Blenkinsop: it killed Louis Dubedat. When I handle it, 
it cures. When another man handles it, it kills — some- 
times. 

Jennifer \^na'ively: not yet taking it all in] Then 
why did you let Sir Ralph give it to Louis ? 

RiDGEON. I'm going to tell you. I did it because I 
was in love with you. 

Jennifer [innocently surprised] In lo — You ! an 
elderly man ! 

Ridgeon [thunderstruck, raising his fists to heaven] 
Dubedat: thou art avenged! [He drops his hands and 
collapses on the bench] . I never thought of that. I sup- 
pose I appear to you a ridiculous old fogey. 

Jennifer. But surely — I did not mean to offend you, 
indeed — but you must be at least twenty years older than 
I am. 

Ridgeon. Oh, quite. More, perhaps. In twenty 
years you will understand how little difference that 
makes. 

Jennifer. But even so, how could you think that I 
— his wife — could ever think of you — 

Ridgeon [stopping her with a nervous waving of his 
fingers] Yes, yes, yes, yes: I quite understand: you 
neednt rub it in. 

Jennifer. But — oh, it is only dawning on me now — 
I was so surprised at first — do you dare to tell me that 
it was to gratify a miserable jealousy that you deliber- 
ately — oh ! oh ! you murdered him. 

Ridgeon. I think I did. It really comes to that. 

Thou shall not kill, but needst not strive 
Officiously to keep alive. 

I suppose — yes : I killed him. 



Act V The Doctor's Dilemma 113 

Jennifer. And you tell me that! to my face! cal- 
lously ! You are not afraid ! 

RiDGEON. I am a doctor : I have nothing to fear. It 
is not an indictable offence to call in B. B. Perhaps it 
ought to be ; but it isnt. 

Jennifer. I did not mean that. I meant afraid of 
my taking the law into my own hands, and killing you. 

RiDGEON. I am so hopelessly idiotic about you that I 
should not mind it a bit. You would always remember 
me if you did that. 

Jennifer. I shall remember you always as a little 
man who tried to kill a great one. 

RiDGEON. Pardon me. I succeeded. 

Jennifer l^with quiet conviction^ No. Doctors think 
they hold the keys of life and death; but it is not their 
will that is fulfilled. I dont believe you made any differ- 
ence at all. 

RiDGEON. Perhaps not. But I intended to. 

Jennifer [looking at him amasedly : not without pity] 
And you tried to destroy that wonderful and beautiful 
life merely because you grudged him a woman whom you 
could never have expected to care for you ! 

RiDGEON. Who kissed my hands. Who believed in 
me. Who told me her friendship lasted until death. 

Jennifer. And whom you were betraying. 

RiDGEON. No. Whom I was saving. 

Jennifer [gently] Pray, doctor, from what? 

RiDGEON. From making a terrible discovery. From 
having your life laid waste. 

Jennifer. How? 

RiDGEON. No matter. I have saved you. I have 
been the best friend you ever had. You are happy. You 
are well. His works are an imperishable joy and pride 
for you. 

Jennifer. And you think that is your doing. Oh 
doctor, doctor! Sir Patrick is right: you do think you 



114 The Doctor's Dilemma Act V^ 

are -a little god. How can you be so silly? You did not 
paint those pictures which are my imperishable joy and 
pride: you did not speak the words that will always be 
heavenly music in my ears. I listen to them now when- 
ever I am tired or sad. That is why I am always happy. 

RiDGEON. Yes, now that he is dead. Were you al- 
ways happy when he was alive.'' 

Jennifer [wounded] Oh, you are cruel, cruel. When 
he was alive I did not know the greatness of my blessing. 
I worried meanly about little things. I was unkind to 
him. I was unworthy of him. 

RiDGEON [laugJmig bitterly] Ha! 

Jennifer. Dont insult me: dont blaspheme. [She 
snatches up the hook and presses it to her heart in a pa- 
roxysm of remorse, exclaiming] Oh, my King of Men ! 

RiDGEON. King of Men ! Oh, this is too monstrous, 
too grotesque. We cruel doctors have kept the secret 
from you faithfully ; but it is like all secrets : it will not 
not keep itself. The buried truth germinates and breaks 
through to the light. 

Jennifer. What truth.'' 

RiDGEON. What truth ! Why, that Louis Dubedat, 
King of Men, was the most entire and perfect scoundrel, 
the most miraculously mean rascal, the most callously 
selfish blackguard that ever made a wife miserable. 

Jennifer [unshaken: calm and lovely] He made his 
wife the happiest woman in the world, doctor. 

RiDGEON. No : by all thats true on earth, he made his 
widow the happiest woman in the world; but it was I 
who made her a widow. And her hapjiiness is my justi- 
fication and my reward. Now you know what I did and 
what I thought of him. Be as angry with me as you 
like: at least you know me as I really am. If you ever 
come to care for an elderly man, you will know what you 
are caring for. 

Jennifer [kind and quiet] I am not angry with you 



Act V The Doctor's Dilemma 115 

any more, Sir Colenso. I knew quite well that you did 
not like Louis ; but it is not your fault : you dont under- 
stand : that is all. You nev-er could have believed in him. 
It is just like your not believing in my religion: it is a 
sort of sixth sense that you have not got. And [with a 
gentle reassuring movement towards him^ dont think that 
you have shocked me so dreadfully. I know quite well 
what you mean by his selfishness. He sacrificed every- 
thing for his art. In a certain sense he had even to sac- 
rifice everybody — 

RiDGEON. Everybody except himself. By keeping 
that back he lost the right to sacrifice you, and gave me 
the right to sacrifice him. Which I did. 

Jennifer [shaking her head, pitying his error^ He 
was one of the men who know what women know: that 
self-sacrifice is vain and cowardly. 

RiDGEON. Yes, when the sacrifice is rejected and 
thrown away. Not when it becomes the food of godhead. 

Jennifer. I dont understand that. And I cant argue 
with you : you are clever enough to puzzle me, but not to 
shake me. You are so utterly, so wildly wrong; so inca- 
pable of appreciating Louis — 

RiDGEON. Oh ! [taking up the Secretary's list^ I 
have marked five pictures as sold to me. 

Jennifer. They will not be sold to you. Louis' 
creditors insisted on selling them ; but this is my birth- 
day; and they were all bought in for me this morning by 
my husband. 

RiDGEON. By whom? ! ! ! 

Jennifer. By my husband. 

RiDGEON [gabbling and stutteringi Wliat husband? 
Whose husband? Wliich husband? Whom? how? what? 
Do you mean to say that you have married again? 

Jennifer. Do you forget that Louis disliked wid- 
ows, and that people who have married happily once 
always marry again? 



116 The Doctor's Dilemma Act V 

RiDGEON. Then I have committed a purely disinte- 
rested murder ! 

The Secretary returns with a pile of catalogues. 

The Secretary. Just got the first batch of cata- 
logues in time. The doors are open. 

Jennifer [to Ridgeon, politely] So glad you like 
the pictures. Sir Colenso. Good morning. 

Ridgeon. Good morning. [He goes towards the 
door; hesitates; turns to say something more; gives it up 
as a bad job; and goes]. 



GETTING MARRIED 
XVII 

1908 



N.B. — There is a point of some technical interest to be 
noted in this play. Tlie customary division into acts 
and scenes has been disused, and a return made to unity 
of time and place, as observed in the ancient Greek drama. 
In the foregoing tragedy. The Doctor's Dilemma, there 
are five acts ; the place is altered five times ; and the 
time is spread over an undetermined period of more 
than a year. No doubt the strain on the attention of 
the audience and on the ingenuity of the playwright is 
much less ; but I find in practice that the Greek form 
is inevitable when drama reaches a certain point in 
poetic and intellectual evolution. Its adoption was not, 
on my part, a deliberate display of virtuosity in form, 
but simply the spontaneous falling of a play of ideas 
into the form most suitable to it, which turned out to 
be the classical form. Getting Married, in several acts 
and scenes, with the time spread over a long period, 
would be impossible. 



PREFACE TO GETTING MARRIED 
The Revolt against Marriage 

There is no subject on which more dangerous nonsense 
is talked and thought than marriage. If the mischief 
stopped at talking and thinking it would be bad enough; 
but it goes further, into disastrous anarchical action. Be- 
cause our marriage law is inhuman and unreasonable to 
the point of downright abomination, the bolder and more 
rebellious spirits form illicit unions, defiantly sending 
cards round to their friends announcing what they have 
done. Young women come to me and ask me whether I 
think they ought to consent to marry the man the}^ have 
decided to live with ; and they are perplexed and aston- 
ished when I, who am supposed (heaven knows why!) 
to have the most advanced views attainable on the sub- 
ject, urge them on no account to compromize themselves 
without the security of an authentic wedding ring. They 
cite the example of George Eliot, who formed an illicit 
union with Lewes. They quote a saying attributed 
to Nietzsche, that a married philosopher is ridiculous, 
though tlie men of their choice are not philosophers. 
When they finally give up the idea of reforming our mar- 
riage institutions by private enterprise and personal 
righteousness, and consent to be led to the Registry or 
even to the altar, they insist on first arriving at an ex- 
plicit understanding that both parties are to be perfectly 
free to sip every flower and change every hour, as their 
fancy may dictate, in spite of the legal bond. I do not 

119 



120 Getting Married 

observe that their unions prove less monogamic than other 
people's: rather the contrary, in fact; consequently, I do 
not know whether they make less fuss than ordinary peo- 
ple when either party claims the benefit of the treaty; 
but the existence of the treaty shews the same anarchical 
notion that the law can be set aside by any two private 
persons by the simple process of promising one another 
to ignore it. 

Marriage Nevertheless Inevitable 

Now most laws are, and all laws ought to be, stronger 
than the strongest individual. Certainly the marriage 
law is. The only people who successfully evade it are 
those who actually avail themselves of its shelter by pre- 
tending to be married when they are not, and by Bohe- 
mians who have no position to lose and no career to be 
closed. In every other case open violation of the mar- 
riage laws means either downright ruin or such inconve-i 
nience and disablement as a prudent man or woman' 
would get married ten times over rather than face. And 
these disablements and inconveniences are not even the 
price of freedom; for, as Brieux has shewn so convinc- 
ingly in Les Hannetons, an avowedly illicit union is often 
found in practice to be as tyrannical and as hard to es- 
cape from as the worst legal one. 

We may take it then that when a joint domestic estab- 
lishment, involving questions of children or property, is 
contemplated, marriage is in effect compulsory upon all 
normal people; and until the law is altered there is noth- 
ing for us but to make the best of it as it stands. Even 
when no such establishment is desired, clandestine irregu- 
larities are negligible as an alternative to marriage. 
How common they are nobody knows ; for in spite of the 
powerful protection afforded to the parties by the law 
of libel, and the readiness of society on various other 



Preface 121 

grounds to be hoodwinked by the keeping up of the very- 
thinnest appearances, most of them are probably never 
suspected. But they are neither dignified nor safe and 
comfortable, which at once rules them out for normal de- 
cent people. Marriage remains practically inevitable; 
and the sooner we acknowledge this, the sooner we shall 
set to work to make it decent and reasonable. 

What does the Word Marriage Mean 

However much we may all suffer through marriage^l 
most of us think so little about it that we regard it as ay 
fixed part of the order of nature, like gravitation. Ex-; 
cept for this error, which may be regarded as constant, 
we use the word with reckless looseness, meaning a dozen 
different things by it, and yet always assuming that to 
a respectable man it can have only one meaning. The 
pious citizen, suspecting the Socialist (for example) of 
unmentionable things, and asking him heatedly whether 
he wishes to abolish marriage, is infuriated by a sense of 
unanswerable quibbling when the Socialist asks him what 
particular variety of marriage he means: English civil 
marriage, sacramental marriage, indissoluble Roman 
Catholic marriage, marriage of divorced persons, Scotch 
marriage, Irish marriage, French, German, Turkish, or j 
South Dakotan marriage. In Sweden, one of the most 
highly civilized countries in the world, a marriage is dis- 
solved if both i^arties wish it, without any question of 
conduct. That is what marriage means in Sweden, In 
Clapham that is what they call by the senseless name of 
Free Love. In the British Empire we have unlimited 
Kulin polygamy, Muslim polygamy limited to four wives, 
child marriages, and, nearer home, marriages of first 
cousins: all of them abominations in the eyes of many 
worthy persons. Not only may the respectable British 
champion of marriage mean any of these widely different 



122 Getting Married 

institutions ; sometimes he does not mean marriage at all. 
He means monogamy, chastity, temperance, respectabil- 
ity, morality, Christianity, anti-socialism, and a dozen 
other things that have no necessary connection with mar- 
riage. He often means something that he dare not avow : 
ownership of the person of another human being, for in- 
stance. And he never tells the truth about his own mar- 
riage either to himself or any one else. 

With those individualists who in the mid-XIXth cen- 
tury dreamt of doing away with marriage altogether on 
the ground tha1( it is a private concern between the two 
parties with which society has nothing to do, there is now 
no need to deal..' The vogue of " the self -regarding ac- 
tion " has passed ; and it may be assumed without argu- 
ment that unions for the purpose of establishing a family 
will continue to be registered and regulated by the State. 
Such registration is marriage, and will continue to be 
called marriage long after the conditions of the registra- 
tion have changed so much that no citizen now living 
would recognize them as marriage conditions at all if he 
revisited the earth. There is therefore no question of 
abolishing marriage ; but there is a very pressing question 
of improving its conditions. I have never met anybody 
really in favor of maintaining marriage as it exists in 
England to-day. A Roman Catholic may obey his 
Church by assenting verbally to the doctrine of indis- 
soluble marriage. But nobody worth counting believes 
directly, frankly, and instinctively that when a person 
commits a murder and is put into prison for twenty years 
for it, the free and innocent husband or wife of that mur- 
derer should remain bound by the marriage. To put it 
briefly, a contract for better for worse is a contract that 
should not be tolerated. /* As a matter of fact it is not tol- 
erated fully even by the Roman Catholic Church ; for Ro- 
man Catholic marriages can be dissolved, if not by the 
temporal Courts, by the Pope.. Indissoluble marriage is 



Preface 123 

an academic figment, advocated only by celibates and by 
comfortably married people who imagine that if other 
couples are uncomfortable it must be their own fault, just 
as rich people are apt to imagine that if other people are 
poor it serves them right. There is always some means 
of dissolution. The conditions of dissolution may vary 
widely, from those on which Henry VIII. procured his 
divorce from Katharine of Arragon to the pleas on which 
American wives obtain divorces (for instance, " mental 
anguish " caused by the husband's neglect to cut his toe- 
nails) ; but there is always some point at which the the- 
ory of the inviolable better-for-worse marriage breaks 
down in practice. South Carolina has indeed passed 
what is called a freak law declaring that a marriage shall 
not be dissolved under any circumstances ; but such an 
absurdity will probably be repealed or amended by sheer 
force of circumstances before these words are in print. 
The only question to be considered is. What shall the 
conditions of the dissolution be? 

Survivals of Sex Slavery 

If we adopt the common romantic assumption that the 
object of marriage is bliss, then the very strongest rea- 
son for dissolving a marriage is that it shall be disagree- 
able to one or other or both of the parties. If we accept 
the view that the object of marriage is to provide for the 
production and rearing of children, then childlessness 
should be a conclusive reason for dissolution. As neither 
of these causes entitles married persons to divorce it is 
at once clear that our marriage law is not founded on 
either assumption. What it is really founded on is the 
morality of the tenth commandment, Avhich English- 
women will one day succeed in obliterating from the 
walls of our churches by refusing to enter any building 
where they are publicly classed with a man's house, his 



124 Getting Married 



1 



ox, and his ass, as his purchased chattels. In this mo- 
rality female adultery is malversation by the woman and 
theft by the man, whilst male adultery with an unmarried 
woman is not an offence at all. But though this is not 
only the theory of our marriage laws, but the practical 
morality of many of us, it is no longer an avowed moral- 
ity, nor does its persistence depend on marriage; for the 
abolition of marriage would, other things remaining un- 
changed, leave women more effectually enslaved than 
they now are. We shall come to the question of the eco- 
nomic dependence of women on men later on; but at 
present we had better confine ourselves to the theories of 
marriage which we are not ashamed to acknowledge and 
defend, and upon which, therefore, marriage reformers 
will be obliged to proceed. 

We may, I think, dismiss from the field of practical 
politics the extreme sacerdotal view of marriage as a 
sacred and indissoluble covenant, because though rein- 
forced by unhappy marriages as all fanaticisms are rein- 
forced by human sacrifices, it has been reduced to a pri- 
vate and socially inoperative eccentricity by the introduc- 
tion of civil marriage and divorce. Theoretically, our 
civilly married couples are to a Catholic as unmarried 
couples are: that is, they are living in open sin. Practi- 
cally, civilly married couples are received in society, by 
Catholics and everyone else, precisely as sacramentally 
married couples are ; and so are people who have divorced 
their wives or husbands and married again. And yet 
marriage is enforced by public opinion with such ferocity 
that the least suggestion of laxity in its support is fatal 
to even the highest and strongest reputations, although 
laxity of conduct is winked at with grinning indulgence ; 
so that we find the austere Shelley denounced as a fiend 
in human form, whilst Nelson, who openly left his wife 
and formed a menage a trois with Sir William and Lady 
Hamilton, was idolized. Shelley might have had an ille- 



Preface 125 

gitimate child in every county in England if he had done 
so frankly as a sinner. His unpardonable offence was 
that he attacked marriage as an institution. We feel a 
strange anguish of terror and hatred against him, as 
against one who threatens us with a mortal injury. What 
is the element in his proposals that produces this effect? 
The answer of the specialists is the one already alluded 
to : that the attack on marriage is an attack on property ; 
so that Shelley was something more hateful to a husband 
than a horse thief: to wit, a wife thief, and something 
more hateful to a wife than a burglar: namely, one who 
would steal her husband's house from over her head, and 
leave her destitute and nameless on the streets. Now, no 
doubt this accoiuits for a good deal of anti-Shelleyan 
prejudice: a prejudice so deeply rooted in our habits 
that, as I have shewn in my play, men who are bolder 
freethinkers than Shelley himself can no more bring 
themselves to commit adultery than to commit any com- 
mon theft, whilst women who loathe sex slavery more 
fiercely than Mary Wollstonecraft are unable to face the 
insecurity and discredit of the vagabondage which is the 
masterless woman's only alternative to celibacy. But in 
spite of all this there is a revolt against marriage which 
has spread so rapidly within my recollection that though 
we all still assume the existence of a huge and dangerous 
majority which regards the least hint of scepticism as to 
the beauty and holiness of marriage as infamous and ab- 
horrent, I sometimes wonder why it is so difficult to find 
an authentic living member of this dreaded army of con- 
vention outside the ranks of the people who never think 
about public questions at all, and who, for all their nu- 
merical weight and apparently invincible prejudices, ac- 
cept social changes to-day as tamely as their forefathers 
accepted the Reformation under Henry and Edward, the 
Restoration under Mary, and, after Mary's death, the 
shandygaff which Elizabeth compounded from both doc- 



126 Getting Married 



trines and called the Articles of the Church of England. 
If matters were left to these simple folk, there would 
never be any changes at all; and society would perish 
like a snake that could not cast its skins. Nevertheless 
the snake does change its skin in spite of them ; and there 
are signs that our marriage-law skin is causing discom- 
fort to thoughtful people and will presently be cast 
whether the others are satisfied with it or not. The ques- 
tion therefore arises: What is there in marriage that 
makes the thoughtful people so uncomfortable.^ 



The New Attack on Marriage 

The answer to this question is an answer which every- 
body knows and nobody likes to give. What is driving 
our ministers of religion and statesmen to blurt it out at 
last is the plain fact that marriage is now beginning to 
depopulate the country with such alarming rapidity that 
we are forced to throw aside our modesty like people 
who, awakened by an alarm of fire, rush into the streets 
in their nightdresses or in no dresses at all. The ficti- 
tious Free Lover, who was supposed to attack marriage 
because it thwarted his inordinate affections and pre- 
vented him from making life a carnival, has vanished 
and given place to the very real, very strong, very austere 
avenger of outraged decency who declares that the licen- 
tiousness of marriage, now that it no longer recruits the 
race, is destroying it. 

As usual, this change of front has not yet been noticed 
by our newspaper controversialists and by the suburban 
season-ticket holders whose minds the newspapers make. 
They still defend the citadel on the side on which nobody 
is attacking it, and leave its weakest front imdefended. 

The religious revolt against marriage is a very old one. 
Christianity began with a fierce attack on marriage; and 



1 



Preface 127 

to this day the celibacy of the Roman Catholic priesthood 
is a standing protest against its compatibility with the 
higher life. St. Paul's reluctant sanction of marriage; 
his personal protest that he countenanced it of necessity 
and against his own conviction ; his contemptuous " bet- 
ter to marry than to burn " is only out of date in respect 
of his belief that the end of the world was at hand and 
that there was therefore no longer any population ques- 
tion. His instinctive recoil from its worst aspect as a 
slavery to pleasure which induces two people to accept 
slavery to one another has remained an active force in 
the world to this day^ and is now stirring more uneasily 
than ever. We have more and more Pauline celibates 
whose objection to marriage is the intolerable indignity 
of being supposed to desire or live the married life as 
ordinarily conceived. Every thoughtful and observant 
minister of religion is troubled by the determination of 
his flock to regard marriage as a sanctuary for pleasure, 
seeing as he does that the known libertines of his parish 
are visibly suffering much less from intemperance than 
many of the married people who stigmatize them as mon- 
sters of vice. 

A Forgotten Conference of Married Men 

The late Hugh Price Hughes, an eminent Methodist 
divine, once organized in London a conference of re- 
spectable men to consider the subject. Nothing came of 
it (nor indeed could have come of it in the absence of 
women) ; but it had its value as giving the young sociolo- 
gists present, of whom I was one, an authentic notion of 
what a picked audience of respectable men understood by 
married life. It was certainly a staggering revelation. 
Peter the Great would have been shocked; Byron would 
have been horrified; Don Juan would have fled from the 
conference into a monastery. The respectable men all 



128 Getting Married 

regarded the marriage ceremony as a rite which absolved 
them from the laws of health and temperance; inaugu- 
rated a life-long honeymoon; and placed their pleasures 
on exactly the same footing as their prayers. It seemed 
entirely proper and natural to them that out of every 
twenty-four hours of their lives they should pass eight 
shut up in one room with their wives alone, and this, not 
birdlike, for the mating season, but all the year round 
and every year. How they settled even such minor ques- 
tions as to which party should decide whether and how 
much the window should be open and how many blankets 
should be on the bed, and at what hour they should go 
to bed and get up so as to avoid disturbing one another's 
sleep, seemed insoluble questions to me. But the mem- 
bers of the conference did not seem to mind. They were 
content to have the whole national housing problem 
treated on a basis of one room for two people. That was 
the essence of marriage for them. 

Please remember, too, that there was nothing in their 
circumstances to check intemperance. They were men 
of business: that is, men for the most part engaged in 
routine work which exercized neither their minds nor 
their bodies to the full pitch of their capacities. Com- 
pared with statesmen, first-rate professional men, artists, 
and even with laborers and artisans as far as muscular 
exertion goes, they were underworked, and could spare 
the fine edge of their faculties and the last few inches of 
their chests without being any the less fit for their daily 
routine. If I had adopted their habits, a startling dete- 
rioration would have appeared in my writing before the 
end of a fortnight, and frightened me back to what they 
would have considered an impossible asceticism. But 
they paid no penalty of which they were conscious. 
They had as much health as they wanted: that is, they 
did not feel the need of a doctor. They enjoyed their 
smokes^ their meals, their respectable clothes, their affec- 



Preface 129 

tionate games with their children, their prospects of 
larger profits or higher salaries, their Saturday half 
holidays and Sunday walks, and the rest of it. They 
did less than two hours work a day and took from seven 
to nine office hours to do it in. And they were no good 
for any mortal purpose except to go on doing it. They 
were respectable only by the standard they themselves 
had set. Considered seriously as electors governing an 
empire through their votes, and choosing and maintaining 
its religious and moral institutions by their powers of 
social persecution, they were a black-coated army of ca- 
lamity. They were incapable of comprehending the in- 
dustries they were engaged in, the laws under which they 
lived, or the relation of their country to other countries. 
They lived the lives of old men contentedly. They were 
timidly conservative at the age at which every healthy 
human being ought to be obstreperously revolutionary. 
And their wives went through the routine of the kitchen, 
nursery, and drawing-room just as they went through the 
routine of the office. They had all, as they called it, set- 
tled down, like balloons that had lost their lifting margin 
of gas; and it was evident that the process of settling 
down would go on until they settled into their graves. 
They read old-fashioned newspapers with effort, and 
were just taking with avidity to a new sort of paper, 
costing a halfpenny, which they believed to be extraordi- 
narily bright and attractive, and which never really suc- 
ceeded until it became extremely dull, discarding all seri- 
ous news and replacing it by vapid tittle-tattle, and sub- 
stituting for political articles informed by at least some 
pretence of knowledge of economics, history, and consti- 
tutional law, such paltry follies and sentimentalities, 
snobberies and partisaneries, as ignorance can under- 
stand and irresponsibility relish. 

What they called patriotism was a conviction that 
because they were born in Tooting or Camberwell, they 



130 Getting Married 

were the natural superiors of Beethoven, of Rodin, of 
Ibsen, of Tolstoy and all other benighted foreigners. 
Those of them who did not think it wrong to go to the 
theatre liked above everything a play in which the hero 
was called Dick; was continually fingering a briar pipe; 
and, after being overwhelmed with admiration and affec- 
tion through three acts, was finally rewarded with the 
legal possession of a pretty heroine's person on the 
strength of a staggering lack of virtue. Indeed their 
only conception of the meaning of the word virtue was 
abstention from stealing other men's wives or from re- 
fusing to marry their daughters. 

As to law, religion, ethics, and constitutional govern- 
ment, any counterfeit could impose on them. Any atheist 
could pass himself off on them as a bishop, any anarchist 
as a judge, any despot as a Whig, any sentimental social- 
ist as a Tory, any philtre-monger or witch-finder as a 
man of science, any phrase-maker as a statesman. Those 
who did not believe the story of Jonah and the great fish 
were all the readier to believe that metals can be trans- 
muted and all diseases cured by radium, and that men 
can live for two hundred years by drinking sour milk. 
Even these credulities involved too severe an intellectual 
effort for many of them: it was easier to grin and believe 
nothing. They maintained their respect for themselves 
by " playing the game " (that is, doing what everybody 
else did), and by being good judges of hats, ties, dogs, 
pipes, cricket, gardens, flowers, and the like. They were 
capable of discussing each other's solvency and respecta- 
bility with some shrewdness, and could carry out quite 
complicated systems of paying visits and " knowing " 
one another. They felt a little vulgar when they spent 
a day at Margate, and quite distinguished and travelled 
when they spent it at Boulogne. They were, except as 
to their clothes, " not particular ": that is, they could put 
up with ugly eights and soimds, unhealthy smells, and 



Preface 131 

inconvenient houses, with inhuman apathy and callous- 
ness. They had, as to adults, a theory that human nature 
is so poor that it is useless to try to make the world any 
better, whilst as to children they believed that if they 
were only sufficiently lectured and whipped, they could 
be brought to a state of moral perfection such as no fa- 
natic has ever ascribed to his deity. Though they were 
not intentionally malicious, they practised the most ap- 
palling cruelties from mere thoughtlessness, thinking 
nothing of imprisoning men and women for periods up 
to twenty years for breaking into their houses ; of treat- 
ing their children as wild beasts to be tamed by a sys- 
tem of blows and imprisonment which they called 
education; and of keeping pianos in their houses, not 
for musical purposes, but to torment their daughters 
with a senseless stupidity that would have revolted an 
inquisitor. 

In short, dear reader, they were very like you and me. 
I could fill a hundred pages with the tale of our imbe- 
cilities and still leave much untold; but what I have set 
down here haphazard is enough to condemn the system 
that produced us. The corner stone of that system was 
the family and the institution of marriage as we have it 
to-day in England. 

Hearth and Home 

There is no shirking it : if marriage cannot be made to 
produce something better than we are, marriage will have 
to go, or else the nation will have to go. It is no use 
talking of honor, virtue, purity, and wholesome, sweet, 
clean, English home lives when what is meant is simply 
the habits I have described. The flat fact is that English 
home life to-day is neither honorable, virtuous, whole- 
some, sweet, clean, nor in any creditable way distinct- 
ively English. It is in many respects conspicuously the 



132 Getting Married 

reverse; and the result of withdrawing children from it 
completely at an early age, and sending them to a public 
school and then to a university, does, in spite of the fact 
that these institutions are class warped and in some re- 
spects quite abominably corrupt, produce sociabler men. 
Women, too, are improved by the escape from home pro- 
vided by women's colleges ; but as very few of them are 
fortunate enough to enjoy this advantage, most women 
are so thoroughly home-bred as to be unfit for human so- 
ciety. So little is expected of them that in Sheridan's 
School for Scandal we hardly notice that the heroine is 
a female cad, as detestable and dishonorable in her re- 
pentance as she is vulgar and silly in her naughtiness. 
It was left to an abnormal critic like George Gissing to 
point out the glaring fact that in the remarkable set of 
life studies of XlXth century women to be found in the 
novels of Dickens, the most convincingly real ones are 
either vilely unamiable or comically contemptible; whilst 
his attempts to manufacture admirable heroines by ideali- 
zations of home-bred womanhood are not only absurd but 
not even pleasantly absurd: one has no patience with 
them. 

As all this is corrigible by reducing home life and 
domestic sentiment to something like reasonable propor- 
tions in the life of the individual, the danger of it does 
not lie in human nature. Home life as we imderstand it 
is no more natural to us than a cage is natural to a cocka- 
too. Its grave danger to the nation lies in its narrow 
views, its unnaturally sustained and sjjitefully jealous 
concupiscences, its petty tyrannies, its false social pre- 
tences, its endless grudges and squabbles, its sacrifice of 
the boy's future by setting him to earn money to help 
the family when he should be in training for his adult 
life (remember the boy Dickens and the blacking fac- 
tory), and of the girl's chances by making her a slave 
to sick or selfish parents, its unnatural packing into little 



Preface 133 

brick boxes of little parcels of humanity of ill-assorted 
ages, with the old scolding or beating the young for be- 
having like young people, and the young hating and 
thwarting the old for behaving like old people, and all 
the other ills, mentionable and unmentionable, that arise 
from excessive segregation. It sets these evils up as 
benefits and blessings representing the highest attainable 
degree of honor and virtue, whilst any criticism of or 
revolt against them is savagely persecuted as the ex- 
tremity of vice. The revolt, driven under ground and 
exacerbated, produces debauchery veiled by hypocrisy, an 
overwhelming demand for licentious theatrical entertain- 
ments which no censorship can stem, and, worst of all, a 
confusion of virtue with the mere morality that steals its 
name until the real thing is loathed because the imposture 
is loathsome. Literary traditions spring up in which the 
libertine and profligate — Tom Jones and Charles Surface 
are the heroes, and decorous, law-abiding persons — Blifil 
and Joseph Surface — are the villains and butts. People 
like to believe that Nell Gwynne has every amiable qual- 
ity and the Bishop's wife every odious one. Poor Mr. 
Pecksniff, who is generally no worse than a humbug with 
a turn for pompous talking, is represented as a criminal 
instead of as a very typical English paterfamilias keep- 
ing a roof over the head of himself and his daughters by 
inducing people to pay him more for his services than 
they are worth. In the extreme instances of reaction 
against convention, female murderers get sheaves of 
offers of marriage ; and when Nature throws up that rare 
phenomenon, an unscrupulous libertine, his success among 
" well brought-up " girls is so easy, and the devotion he 
inspires so extravagant, that it is impossible not to see 
that the revolt against conventional respectability has 
transfigured a commonplace rascal into a sort of An- 
archist Saviour. As to the respectable voluptuary, who 
joins Omar Khayyam clubs and vibrates to Swinburne's 



134 Getting Married 

invocation of Dolores to " come down and redeem us 
from virtue," he is to be found in every suburb. 



Too Much of a Good Thing 

We must be reasonable in our domestic ideals. I do 
not think that life at a public school is altogether good 
for a boy any more than barrack life is altogether good 
for a soldier. But neither is home life altogether good. 
Such good as it does, I should say, is due to its freedom 
from the very atmosphere it professes to supply. That 
atmosphere is usually described as an atmosphere of love ; 
and this definition should be sufficient to put any sane 
person on guard against it. The people who talk and 
write as if the highest attainable state is that of a family 
stewing in love continuously from the cradle to the grave, 
can hardly have given five minutes serious consideration 
to so outrageous a proposition. They cannot have even 
made up their minds as to what they mean by love; for 
when they expatiate on their thesis they are sometimes 
talking about kindness, and sometimes about mere appe- 
tite. In either sense they are equally far from the reali- 
ties of life. No healthy man or animal is occupied with 
love in any sense for more than a very small fraction in- 
deed of the time he devotes to business and to recreations 
wholly unconnected with love. A wife entirely preoccu- 
pied with her affection for her husband, a mother entirely 
preoccupied with her affection for her children, may be 
all very well in a book (for people who like that kind of 
book) ; but in actual life she is a nuisance. Husbands 
may escape from her when their business compels them 
to be away from home all day; but young children may 
be, and quite often are, killed by her cuddling and cod- 
dling and doctoring and preaching: above all, by her 
continuous attempts to excite precocious sentimentality. 



Preface 135 

a practice as objectionable, and possibly as mischievous, 
as the worst tricks of the worst nursemaids. 



Large and Small Families 

In most healthy families there is a revolt against this 
tendency. The exchanging of presents on birthdays and 
the like is barred by general consent, and the relations 
of the parties are placed by express treaty on an unsen- 
timental footing. 

Unfortunately this mitigation of family sentimentality 
is much more characteristic of large families than small 
ones. It used to be said that members of large families 
get on in the world; and it is certainly true that for pur- 
poses of social training a household of twenty surpasses 
a household of five as an Oxford College surpasses an 
eight-roomed house in a cheap street. Ten children, with 
the necessary adults, make a community in which an ex- 
cess of sentimentality is impossible. Two children make 
a doll's house, in which both parents and children become 
morbid if they keep to themselves. What is more, when 
large families were the fashion, they were organized as 
tyrannies much more than as " atmospheres of love." 
Francis Place tells us that he kept out of his father's 
way because his father never passed a child within his 
reach without striking it; and though the case was an 
extreme one, it was an extreme that illustrated a ten- 
dency. Sir Walter Scott's father, when his son incau- 
tiously expressed some relish for his porridge, dashed a 
handful of salt into it with an instinctive sense that it 
was his duty as a father to prevent his son enjoying him- 
self. Ruskin's mother gratified the sensual side of her 
maternal passion, not by cuddling her son, but by whip- 
ping him when he fell downstairs or was slack in learn- 
ing the Bible off by heart; and this grotesque safety- 
valve for voluptuousness, mischievous as it was in many 



136 Getting Married 

ways, had at least the advantage that the child did not 
enjoy it and was not debauched by it, as he would have 
been by transports of sentimentality. 

But nowadays we cannot depend on these safeguards, 
such as they were. We no longer have large families : all 
the families are too small to give the children the neces- 
sary social training. The Roman father is out of fash- 
ion ; and the whip and the cane are becoming discredited, 
not so much by the old arguments against corporal pun- 
ishment (sound as these were) as by the gradual wearing 
away of the veil from the fact that flogging is a form of 
debauchery. The advocate of flogging as a punishment 
is now exposed to very disagreeable suspicions; and ever 
since Rousseau rose to the effort of making a certain very 
ridiculous confession on the subject, there has been a 
growing perception that child whipping, even for the 
children themselves, is not always the innocent and high- 
minded practice it professes to be. At all events there 
is no getting away from the facts that families are 
smaller than they used to be, and that passions which 
formerly took eifect in tyranny have been largely di- 
verted into sentimentality. And though a little sentimen- 
tality may be a very good thing, chronic sentimentality 
is a horror, more dangerous, because more possible, than 
the erotomania which we all condemn when we are not 
thoughtlessly glorifying it as the ideal married state. 

The Gospel of Laodicea 

Let us try to get at the root error of these false domes- 
tice doctrines. Why was it that the late Samuel Butler, 
with a conviction that increased with his experience of 
life, preached the gospel of Laodicea, urging people to be 
temperate in what they called goodness as in everything 
else.? Why is it that I, when I hear some well-meaning 
person exhort young people to make it a rule to do at 



J 



Preface 137 

least one kind action every day, feel very much as I 
should if I heard them persuade children to get drunk at 
least once every day? Apart from the initial absurdity 
of accepting as permanent a state of things in which 
there would be in this country misery enough to supply 
occasion for several thousand million kind actions per 
annum, the effect on the character of the doers of the 
actions would be so appalling, that one month of any 
serious attempt to carry out such counsels would proba- 
bly bring about more stringent legislation against actions 
going beyond the strict letter of the law in the way of 
kindness than we have now against excess in the opposite 
direction. 

There is no more dangerous mistake than the mistake 
of supposing that we cannot have too much of a good 
thing. The truth is, an immoderately good man is very 
much more dangerous than an immoderately bad man: 
that is why Savonarola was burnt and John of Leyden 
torn to pieces with red-hot pincers whilst multitudes of 
unredeemed rascals were being let off with clipped ears, 
burnt palms, a flogging, or a few years in the galleys. 
That is why Christianity never got any grip of the world 
until it virtually reduced its claims on the ordinary citi- 
zen's attention to a couple of hours every seventh day, 
and let him alone on week-days. If the fanatics who 
are preoccupied day in and day out with their salvation 
were healthy, virtuous, and wise, the Laodiceanism of the 
ordinary man might be regarded as a deplorable short- 
coming; but, as a matter of fact, no more frightful mis- 
fortune could threaten us than a general spread of fa- 
naticism. What people call goodness has to be kept in 
check just as carefully as what they call badness; for 
the human constitution will not stand very much of either 
without serious psychological mischief, ending in insanity 
or crime. The fact that the insanity may be privileged, 
as Savonarola's was up to the point of wrecking the social 



138 Getting Married 

life of Florence, does not alter the case. We always 
hesitate to treat a dangerously good man as a lunatic be- 
cause he may turn out to be a prophet in the true sense: 
that is, a man of exceptional sanity who is in the right 
when we are in the wrong. However necessary it may 
have been to get rid of Savonarola, it was foolish to poi- 
son Socrates and burn St. Joan of Arc. But it is none 
the less necessary to take a firm stand against the mon- 
strous proposition that because certain attitudes and sen- 
timents may be heroic and admirable at some momentous 
crisis, they should or can be maintained at the same pitch 
continuously through life. A life spent in prayer and 
almsgiving is really as insane as a life spent in cursing 
and picking pockets: the effect of everybody doing it 
would be equally disastrous. The superstitious tolerance 
so long accorded to monks and nuns is inevitably giving 
way to a very general and very natural practice of con- 
fiscating their retreats and expelling them from their 
country, with the result that they come to England and 
Ireland, where they are partly unnoticed and partly en- 
couraged because they conduct technical schools and 
teach our girls softer speech and gentler manners than 
our comparatively ruffianly elementary teachers. But 
they are still full of the notion that because it is possible 
for men to attain the summit of Mont Blanc and stay 
there for an hour, it is possible for them to I've there. 
Children are punished and scolded for not living there; 
and adults take serious offence if it is not assumed that 
they live there. 

As a matter of fact, ethical strain is just as bad for 
us as physical strain. It is desirable that the normal 
pitch of conduct at which men are not conscious of being 
particularly virtuous, although they feel mean when they 
fall below it, should be raised as high as possible ; but it 
is not desirable that they should attempt to live above this 
pitch any more than that they should habitually walk at 



Preface 139 

the rate of five miles an hour or carry a hundredweight 
continually on their backs. Their normal condition 
should be in nowise difficult or remarkable; and it is a 
perfectly sound instinct that leads us to mistrust the 
good man as much as the bad man, and to object to the 
clergyman who is pious extra-professionally as much as 
to the professional pugilist who is quarrelsome and vio- 
lent in private life. We do not want good men and bad 
men any more than we want giants and dwarfs. What 
we do want is a high quality for our normal : that is, peo- 
ple who can be much better than what we now call re- 
spectable without self-sacrifice. Conscious goodness, like 
conscious muscular effort, may be of use in emergencies; 
but for everyday national use it is negligible; and its 
effect on the character of the individual may easily be 
disastrous. 

For Better For Worse 

It would be hard to find any document in practical 
daily use in which these obvious truths seem so stupidly 
overlooked as they are in the marriage service. As we 
have seen, the stupidity is only apparent : the service was 
really only an honest attempt to make the best of a com- 
mercial contract of property and slavery by subjecting 
it to some religious restraint and elevating it by some 
touch of poetry. But the actual result is that when 
two people are under the influence of the most violent, 
most insane, most delusive, and most transient of pas- 
sions, they are required to swear that they will remain 
in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition con- 
tinuously until death do them part. And though of 
course nobody expects them to do anything so impossible 
and so unwholesome, yet the law that regulates their re- 
lations, and the public opinion that regulates that law, 
is actually founded on the assumption that the marriage 



140 Getting Married 

vow is not only feasible but beautiful and holy, and that 
if they are false to it, they deserve no sympathy and no 
relief. If all married people really lived together, no 
doubt the mere force of facts would make an end to this 
inhuman nonsense in a month, if not sooner; but it is 
very seldom brought to that test. The typical British 
husband sees much less of his wife than he does of his 
business partner, his fellow clerk, or whoever works be- 
side him day by day. Man and wife do not as a rule, 
live together : they only breakfast together, dine together, 
and sleep in the same room. In most cases the woman 
knows nothing of the man's working life and he knows 
nothing of her working life (he calls it her home life). 
It is remarkable that the very people who romance most 
absurdly about the closeness and sacredness of the mar- 
riage tie are also those who are most convinced that the 
man's sphere and the woman's sphere are so entirely 
separate that only in their leisure moments can they ever 
be together. A man as intimate with his own wife as a 
magistrate is with his clerk, or a Prime Minister with the 
leader of the Opposition, is a man in ten thousand. The 
majority of married couples never get to know one an- 
other at all : they only get accustomed to having the same 
house, the same children, and the same income, which is 
quite a different matter. The comparatively few men 
who work at home — writers, artists, and to some extent 
clergymen — have to effect some sort of segregation with- 
in the house or else run a heavy risk of overstraining 
their domestic relations. When the pair is so poor that 
it can afford only a single room, the^ strain is intolerable: 
violent quarrelling is the result. \ Very few couples can 
live in a single-roomed tenement without exchanging 
blows quite frequently. ■ In the leisured classes there is 
often no real family life at all. The boys are at a public 
school; the girls are in the schoolroom in charge of a 
governess ; the husband is at his club or in a set which is 



Preface I'il 

not his wife's; and the institution of marriage enjoys the 
credit of a domestic peace which is hardly more intimate 
than the relations of prisoners in the same gaol or guests 
at the same garden party. Taking these two cases of 
the single room and the unearned income as the extremes, 
we might perhaps locate at a guess whereabout on the 
scale between them any particular family stands. But it 
is clear enough that the one-roomed end, though its con- 
ditions enable the marriage vow to be carried out with the 
utmost attainable exactitude, is far less endurable in 
practice, and far more mischievous in its effect on the 
parties concerned, and through them on the community, 
than the other end. Thus we see that the revolt against 
marriage is by no means only a revolt against its sordid- 
ness as a survival of sex slavery. It may even plausibly 
be maintained that this is precisely the part of it that 
works most smoothly in practice. The revolt is also 
against its sentimentality, its romance, its Amorism, even 
against its enervating happiness. 

Wanted: an Immoral Statesman 

We now see that the statesman who undertakes to deal 
with marriage will have to face an amazingly complicated 
public opinion. In fact, he will have to leave opinion 
as far as possible out of the question, and deal with hu- 
man nature instead. For even if there could be any real 
public opinion in a society like ours, which is a mere mob 
of classes, each with its own habits and prejudices, it 
would be at best a jumble of superstitions and interests, 
taboos and hypocrisies, which could not be reconciled in 
any coherent enactment. It would probably proclaim 
passionately that it does not matter in the least what sort 
of children we have, or how few or how many, provided 
the children are legitimate. Also that it does not matter 
in the least what sort of adults we have, provided they 



142 Getting Married 

are married. No statesman worth the name can possibly 
act on these views. He is bound to prefer one healthy 
illegitimate child to ten rickety legitimate ones, and one 
energetic and capable unmarried couple to a dozen infe- 
rior apathetic husbands and wives. 1 If it could be proved 
that illicit unions produce three cliildren each and mar- 
riages only one and a half, he would be bound to encour- 
age illicit unions and discourage and even penalize mar- 
riage. The common notion that the existing forms of 
marriage are not political contrivances, but sacred ethical 
obligations to which everything, even the very existence 
of the human race, must be sacrificed if necessary (and 
this is what the vulgar morality we mostly profess on the 
subject comes to) is one on which no sane Government 
could act for a moment; and yet it influences, or is be- 
lieved to influence, so many votes, that no Government 
will touch the marriage question if it can possibly help 
it, even when there is a demand for the extension of mar- 
riage, as in the case of the recent long-delayed Act legal- 
izing marriage with a deceased wife's sister. When a 
reform in the other direction is needed (for example, an 
extension of divorce), not even the existence of the most 
unbearable hardships will induce our statesmen to move 
so long as the victims submit sheepishly, though when 
they take the remedy into their own hands an inquiry is 
soon begun. But what is now making some action in the 
matter imperative is neither the sufferings of those who 
are tied for life to criminals, drunkards, physically un- 
sound and dangerous mates, and worthless and unamiable 
people generally, nor the immorality of the couples con-" 
demned to celibacy by separation orders which do not 
annul their marriages, but the fall in the birth rate. 
Public opinion will not help us out of this difficulty: on 
the contrary, it will, if it be allowed, punish anybody 
who mentions it. When Zola tried to repopulate France 
by writing a novel in praise of parentage, the only com- 



Preface 143 

ment made here was that the book could not possibly be 
translated into English, as its subject was too improper. 

The Limits of Democracy 

Now if England had been governed in the past by 
statesmen willing to be ruled by such public opinion as 
that, she would have been wiped off the political map 
long ago. The modern notion that democracy means 
governing a country according to the ignorance of its 
majorities is never more disastrous than when there is 
some question of sexual morals to be dealt with. The 
business of a democratic statesman is not, as some of us 
seem to think, to convince the voters that he knows no 
better than they as to the methods of attaining their com- 
mon ends, but on the contrary to convince them that he 
knows much better than they do, and therefore differs 
from them on every possible question of method. The 
voter's duty is to take care that the Government consists 
of men whom he can trust to devize or support institu- 
tions making for the common welfare. This is highly 
skilled work; and to be governed by people who set about 
it as the man in the street would set about it is to make 
straight for " red ruin and the breaking up of laws." 
Voltaire said that Mr Everybody is wiser than anybody; 
and whether he is or not, it is his will that must prevail; 
but the will and the way are two very different things. 
For example, it is the will of the people on a hot day 
that the means of relief from the effects of the heat 
should be within the reach of everybody. Nothing could 
be more innocent, more hygienic, more important to the 
social welfare. But the way of the people on such occa- 
sions is mostly to drink large quantities of beer, or, 
among the more luxurious classes, iced claret cup, lemon 
squashes, and the like. To take a moral illustration, the 
will to suppress misconduct and secure efficiency in work 



144 Getting Married 

is general and salutary; but the notion that the best and 
only effective way is by complaining, scolding, punish- 
ing, and revenging is equally general. When Mrs 
Squeers opened an abscess on her pupil's head vv^ith an 
inky penknife, her object was entirely laudable: her 
heart was in the right place: a statesman interfering 
with her on the ground that he did not want the boy 
cured would have deserved impeachment for gross tyr- 
anny. But a statesman tolerating amateur surgical prac- 
tice with inky penknives in school would be a very bad 
Minister of Education. It is on the question of method 
that your expert comes in; and though I am democrat 
enough to insist that he must first convince a representa- 
tive body of amateurs that his way is the right way and 
Mrs Squeers's way the wrong way, yet I very strongly 
object to any tendency to flatter Mrs Squeers into the 
belief that her way is in the least likely to be the right 
way, or that any other test is to be applied to it except 
the test of its effect on human welfare. 



The Science and Art of Politics 

Political Science means nothing else than the devizing 
of the best ways of fulfilling the will of the world; and, 
I repeat, it is skilled work. Once the way is discovered, 
the methods laid down, and the machinery provided, the 
work of the statesman is done, and that of the official 
begins. To illustrate, there is no need for the police 
officer who governs the street traffic to be or to know any 
better than the people who obey the wave of his hand. 
All concerted action involves subordination and the ap- 
pointment of directors at whose signal the others will act. 
There is no more need for them to be superior to the 
rest than for the keystone of an arch to be of harder 
stone than the coping. But when it comes to devizing 
the directions which are to be obeyed : that is, to making 



Preface 145 

new institutions and scraping old ones, then you need 
aristocracy in the sense of government by the best. A 
military state organized so as to carry out exactly the 
impulses of llie average soldier would not last a year. 
The result of trying to make the Church of England re- 
flect the notions of the average churchgoer has reduced 
it to a cipher except for the purposes of a petulantly 
irreligious social and political club. Democracy as to 
the thing to be done may be inevitable (hence the vital 
need for a democracy of supermen) ; but democracy as 
to the way to do it is like letting the passengers drive the 
train: it can only end in collision and wreck. As a mat- 
ter of act, we obtain reforms (such as they are), not by 
allowing the electorate to draft statutes, but by persuad- 
ing it that a certain minister and his cabinet are gifted 
with sufficient political sagacity to find out how to pro- 
duce the desired result. And the usual penalty of taking 
advantage of this power to reform our institutions is 
defeat by a vehement " swing of the pendulum " at the 
next election. Therein lies the peril and the glory of 
democratic statesmanship. A statesman who confines 
himself to popular legislation — or, for the matter of that, 
a playwright who confines himself to popular plays — is 
like a blind man's dog who goes wherever the blind man 
pulls him, on the ground that both of them want to go 
to the same place. 

Why Statesmen Shirk the Marriage 
Question 

The reform of marriage, then, will be a very splendid 
and very hazardous adventure for the Prime Minister 
who takes it in hand. He will be posted on every hoard- 
ing and denounced in every Opposition paper, especially 
in the sporting papers, as the destroyer of the home, the 
family, of decency, of morality, of chastity and what 



146 Getting Married 

not. All the commonplaces of the modern antiSocialist 
Noodle's Oration will be hurled at him. And he will 
have to proceed without the slightest concession to it, 
giving the noodles nothing but their due in the assurance 
" I know how to attain our ends better than you," and 
staking his political life on the conviction carried by that 
assurance, which conviction will depend a good deal on 
the certainty with which it is made, which again can be 
attained only by studying the facts of marriage and un- 
derstanding the needs of the nation. And, after all, he 
will find that the pious commonplaces on which he and 
the electorate are agreed conceal an utter difference in 
the real ends in view : his being public, far-sighted, and 
impersonal, and those of multitudes of the electorate 
narrow, personal, jealous, and corrupt. Under such cir- 
cumstances, it is not to be wondered at that the mere men- 
tion of the marriage question makes a British Cabinet 
shiver with apprehension and hastily pass on to safer 
business. Nevertheless the reform of marriage cannot 
be put off for ever. When its hour comes, what are the 
points the Cabinet will have to take up.'' 

The Question of Population 

First, it will have to make up its mind as to how many 
people we want in the country. If we want less than 
at present, we must ascertain how many less ; and if we 
allow the reduction to be made by the continued opera- 
tion of the present sterilization of marriage, we must 
settle how the process is to be stopped when it has gone 
far enough. [jTBut if we desire to maintain the population 
at its present figure, or to increase it, we must take im- 
mediate steps to induce people of moderate means to 
marry earlier and to have more children. > There is less 
urgency in the case of the very poor an3 the very rich. 
They breed recklessly: the rich because they can afford 



Preface 147 

it, and the poor because they cannot afford the precau- 
tions by which the artisans and the middle classes avoid 
big families. Nevertheless the population declines, be- 
cause the high birth rate of the very poor is coiinterbal- 
anced by a huge infantile-mortality in the slums, whilst 
the very rich are also the very few, and are becoming 
sterilized by the spreading revolt of their women against 
excessive childbearing — sometimes against any child- 
bearing. 

This last cause is important. It cannot be removed by 
any economic readjustment. If every family were pro- 
vided with £10,000 a year tomorrow, women would still 
refuse more and more to continue bearing children until 
they are exhausted whilst numbers of others are bearing 
no children at all. Even if every woman bearing and 
rearing a valuable child received a handsome series of 
payments, thereby making motherhood a real profes- 
sion as it ought to be, the number of women able or will- 
ing to give more of their lives to gestation and nursing 
than three or four children would cost them might not 
be very large if the advance in social organization and 
conscience indicated by such payments involved also the 
opening up of other means of livelihood to women. And 
it must be remembered that urban civilization itself, in- 
sofar as it is a method of evolution (and when it is not 
this, it is simply a nuisance), is a sterilizing process as 
far as numbers go. It is harder to keep up the supply 
of elephants than of sparrows and rabbits; and for the 
same reason it will be harder to keep up the supply of 
highly cultivated men and women than it now is of agri- 
cultural laborers. Bees get out of this difficulty by a 
special system of feeding which enables a queen bee to 
produce 4,000 eggs a day whilst the other females lose 
their sex altogether and become workers supporting the 
males in luxury and idleness until the queen has found 
her mate, when the queen kills him and the quondam 



148 Getting Married 

females kill all the rest (such at least are the accounts 
given by romantic naturalists of the matter). 

The Right to Motherhood 

This system certainly shews a much higher develop- 
ment of social intelligence than our marriage system; 
but if it were physically possible to introduce it into hu- 
man society it would be wrecked by an opposite and not 
less important revolt of women : that is, the revolt against 
compulsory barrenness. In this two classes of women 
are concerned: those who, though they have no desire for 
the presence or care of children, nevertheless feel that 
motherhood is an experience necessary to their complete 
psychical development and understanding of themselves 
and others, and those who, though unable to find or un- 
willing to entertain a husband, would like to cccupy 
themselves with the rearing of children. My own ex- 
perience of discussing this question leads me to believe 
that the one point on which all women are in furious 
secret rebellion against the existing law is the saddling 
of the right to a child with the obligation to become the 
servant of a man. Adoption, or the begging or buying 
or stealing of another woman's child, is no remedy: it 
does not provide the supreme experience of bearing the 
child. 'No political constitution will ever succeed or de- 
serve to succeed unless it includes the recognition of an 
absolute right to sexual experience, and is untainted by 
the Pauline or romantic view of such experience as sin- 
ful in itself. And since this experience in its fullest 
sense must be carried in the case of women to the point 
of childbearing, it can only be reconciled with the accept- 
ance of marriage with the child's father by legalizing 
polygyny, because there are more adult women in the 
country than men. Now though polygyny prevails 
throughout the greater part of the British Empire, and 



Preface 149 

is as practicable here as in India, there is a good deal 
to be said against it, and still more to be felt. However, 
let us put our feelings aside for a moment, and consider 
the question politically. 

Monogamy, Polygyny, and Polyandry 

The number of wives permitted to a single husband or 
of husbands to a single wife under a marriage system, is 
not an ethical problem: it depends solely on the propor- 
tion of the sexes in the population. If in consequence of 
a great war three-quarters of the men in this country 
were killed, it would be absolutely necessary to adopt 
the Mohammedan allowance of four wives to each man in 
order to recruit the population. The fundamental rea- 
son for not allowing women to risk their lives in battle 
and for giving them the first chance of escape in all 
dangerous emergencies: in short, for treating their lives 
as more valuable than male lives, is not in the least a 
chivalrous reason, though men may consent to it under 
the illusion of chivalry. It is a simple matter of neces- 
sity; for if a large proportion of women were killed or 
disabled, no possible readjustment of our marriage law 
could avert the depopulation and consequent political 
ruin of the country, because a woman with several hus- 
bands bears fewer children than a woman with one, 
whereas a man can produce as many families as he has 
wives. The natural foundation of the institution of 
monogamy is not any inherent viciousness in polygyny 
or polyandry, but the hard fact that men and women are 
born in about equal numbers. Unfortunately, we kill so 
many of our male children in infancy that we are left 
with a surplus of adult women which is sufficiently large 
to claim attention, and yet not large enough to enable 
every man to have two wives. Even if it were, we should 
be met by an economic difficulty. A Kaffir is rich in pro- 



150 Getting Married 

portion to the number of his wives, because the women 
are the breadwinners. But in our civilization women are 
not paid for their social work in the bearing and rearing 
of children and the ordering of households ; they are 
quartered on the wages of their husbands. At least four 
out of five of our men could not afford two wives unless 
their wages were nearly doubled. Would it not then be 
well to try unlimited polygyny; so that the remaining 
fifth could have as many wives apiece as they could 
afford? Let us see how this would work. 



The Male Revolt Against Polygyny 

Experience shews that women do not object to 
polygyny when it is customary : on the contrary, they are 
its most ardent supporters. The reason is obvious. The 
question, as it presents itself in practice to a woman, is 
whether it is better to have, say, a whole share in a tenth- 
rate man or a tenth share in a first-rate man. Substitute 
the word Income for the word Man, and you will have 
the question as it presents itself economically to the de- 
pendent woman. The woman whose instincts are ma- 
ternal, who desires superior children more than anything 
else, never hesitates. She would take a thousandth 
share, if necessary, in a husband who was a man in a 
thousand, rather than have some comparatively weedy 
weakling all to herself. It is the comparatively weedy 
weakling, left mateless by polygyny, who objects. Thus, 
it was not the women of Salt Lake City nor even of 
America who attacked Mormon polygyny. It was the 
men. And very naturally. On the other hand, women 
object to polyandry, because polyandry enables the best 
women to monopolize all the men, just as polygyny 
enables the best men to monopolize all the women. That 
is why all our ordinary men and women are unanimous 
in defence of monogamy, the men because it excludes 



Preface 151 

polygyny, and the women because it excludes polyandry. 
The women, left to themselves, would tolerate polygyny. 
The men, left to themselves, would tolerate polyandry. 
But polj^gyny would condemn a great many men, and 
polyandry a great many women, to the celibacy of 
neglect. Hence the resistance any attempt to establish 
unlimited polygyny always provokes, not from the best 
people, but from the mediocrities and the inferiors. If 
we could get rid of our inferiors and screw up our aver- 
age quality until mediocrity ceased to be a reproach, 
thus making every man reasonably eligible as a father 
and every woman reasonably desirable as a mother, 
polygyny and polyandry would immediately fall into 
sincere disrepute, because monogamy is so much more 
convenient and economical that nobody would want to 
share a husband or a wife if he (or she) could have a 
sufficiently good one all to himself (or herself). Thus 
it appears that it is the scarcity of husbands or wives of 
high quality that leads woman to polygyny and men to 
polyandry, and that if this scarcity were cured, monog- 
amy, in the sense of having only one husband or wife 
at a time (facilities for changing are another matter), 
would be found satisfactory. 

Difference between Oriental and 
Occidental Polygyny 

It may now be asked why the polygynist nations have 
not gravitated to monogamy, like the latter-day saints of 
Salt Lake City. The answer is not far to seek: their 
polygyny is limited. By the Mohammedan law a man 
cannot marry more than four wives; and by the unwrit- 
ten law of necessity no man can keep more wives than 
he can afford; so that a man with four wives must be 
quite as exceptional in Asia as a man with a carriage- 
and-pair or a motor car is in Europe, where, nevertheless. 



152 Getting Married 

we may all have as many carriages and motors as we can 
afford to pay for. Kulin polygyny, though imlimited, is 
not really a popular institution: if you are a person of 
high caste you pay another person of very august caste 
indeed to make your daughter momentarily one of his 
sixty or seventy momentary wives for the sake of en- 
nobling your grandchildren; but this fashion of a small 
and intensely snobbish class is negligible as a general 
precedent. In any case, men and women in the East do 
not marry anyone they fancy, as in England and Amer- 
ica. Women are secluded and marriages are arranged. 
In Salt Lake City the free misecluded woman could see 
and meet the ablest man of the community, and tempt 
him to make her his tenth wife by all the arts peculiar 
to women in English-speaking countries. No eastern 
woman can do anything of the sort. The man alone has 
any initiative; but he has no access to the woman; be- 
sides, as we have seen, the difficulty created by male 
license is not polygyny but polyandry, which is not 
allowed. 

Consequently, if we are to make polygyny a success, 
we must limit it. If we have two women to every one 
man, we must allow each man only two wives. That is 
simple; but unfortunately our own actual proportion is, 
roughly, something like l^V woman to 1 man. Now you 
cannot enact that each man shall be allowed 1-^j wives, 
or that each woman who cannot get a husband all to 
herself shall divide herself between eleven already mar- 
ried husbands. Thus there is no way out for us through 
polygyny. There is no way at all out of the present 
system of condemning the superfluous women to barren- 
ness, except by legitimizing the children of women who 
are not married to the fathers. 



Preface 153 

The Old Maid's Right to Motherhood 

Now the right to bear children without taking a hus- 
band could not be confined to women who are superfluous 
in the monogamic reckoning. There is the practical dif- 
ficulty that although in our population there are about a 
million monogamically superfluous women, yet it is quite 
impossible to say of any given unmarried woman that 
she is one of the superfluous. And there is the difficulty 
of principle. The right to bear a child, perhaps the 
most sacred of all women's rights, is not one that should 
have any conditions attached to it except in the interests 
of race welfare. There are many women of admirable 
character, strong, capable, independent, who dislike the 
domestic habits of men ; have no natural turn for moth- 
ering and coddling them ; and find the concession of con- 
jugal rights to any person under any conditions intol- 
erable by their self-respect. Yet the general sense of 
the community recognizes in these very women the fittest 
people to have charge of children, and trusts them, as 
schoolmistresses and matrons of institutions, more than 
women of any other type when it is possible to procure 
them for such work. Why should the taking of a hus- 
band be imposed on these women as the price of their 
right to maternity? I am quite unable to answer that 
question. I see a good deal of first-rate maternal ability 
and sagacity spending itself on bees and poultry and vil- 
lage schools and cottage hospitals ; and I find myself 
repeatedly asking myself why this valuable strain in the 
national breed should be sterilized. Unfortunately, the 
very women whom we should tempt to become mothers 
for the good of the race are the very last people to press 
their services on their country in that way. Plato long 
ago pointed out the importance of being governed by men 
with sufficient sense of responsibility and comprehension 
of public duties to be very reluctant to vmdertake the 



154 Getting Married 

work of governing; and yet we have taken his instruction 
so little to heart that we are at present suffering acutely 
from government by gentlemen who will stoop to all the 
mean shifts of electioneering and incur all its heavy ex- 
penses for the sake of a seat in Parliament. But what 
our sentimentalists have not yet been told is that exactly 
the same thing applies to maternity as to government. 
The best mothers are not those who are so enslaved by 
their primitive instincts that they will bear children no 
matter how hard the conditions are, but precisely those 
who place a very high price on their services, and are 
quite prepared to become old maids if the price is re- 
fused, and even to feel relieved at their escape. Our 
democratic and matrimonial institutions may have their 
merits : at all events they are mostly reforms of some- 
thing worse; but they put a premium on want of self- 
respect in certain very important matters; and the con- 
sequence is that we are very badly governed and are, on 
the whole, an ugly, mean, ill-bred race. 

Ibsen's Chain Stitch 

Let us not forget, however, in our sympathy for the 
superfluous women, that their children must have fathers 
as well as mothers. Who are the fathers to be? All 
monogamists and married women will reply hastily: 
either bachelors or widowers ; and this solution will serve 
as well as another; for it would be hypocritical to pre- 
tend that the difficulty is a practical one. None the less, 
the monogamists, after due reflection, will point out that 
if there are widowers enough the superfluous women are 
not really superfluous, and therefore there is no reason 
why the parties should not marry respectably like other 
people. And they might in that case be right if the rea- 
sons were purely numerical: that is, if every woman were 
willing to take a husband if one could be found for her. 



Preface 155 

and every man willing to take a wife on the same terms ; 
also, please remember, if widows would remain celibate 
to give the ^unmarried women a chance. These ifs will 
not work. [We must recognize two classes of old maids: 
one, the really superfluous women, and the other, the 
women who refuse to accept maternity on^the (to them) 
unbearable condition of taking a husband. From both 
classes may, perhaps, be subtracted for the present the 
large proportion of women who could not afford the ex- 
tra expense of one or more children. I say " perhaps," 
because it is by no means sure that within reasonable 
limits mothers do not make a better fight for subsistence, 
and have not, on the whole, a better time than single 
women. In any case, we have two distinct cases to deal 
with: the superfluous and the voluntary; and it is the 
volmitary whose grit we are most concerned to fertilize. 
But here, again, we cannot put our finger on any par- 
ticular case and pick out Miss Robinson's as superfluous, 
and Miss Wilkinson's as voluntary. Whether we legiti- 
mize the child of the unmarried woman as a duty to the 
superfluous or as a bribe to the voluntary, the practical 
result must be the same: to wit, that the condition of 
marriage now attached to legitimate parentage will be 
withdrawn from all women, and fertile unions outside 
marriage recognized by society. Now clearly the conse- 
quences would not stop there. The strong-minded ladies 
who are resolved to be mistresses in their own houses 
would not be the only ones to take advantage of the new 
law. ; Even women to whom a home without a man in it 
would be no home at all, and who fully intended, if the 
man turned out to be the right one, to live with him 
exactly as married couples live, would, if they were pos- 
sessed of independent means, have every inducement to 
adopt the new conditions instead of the old ones. Only 
the women whose sole means of livelihood was wifehood 
would insist on marriage: hence a tendency would set in 



156 Getting Married 

to make marriage more and more one of the customs im- 
posed by necessity on the poor, whilst the freer form of 
union, regulated, no doubt, by settlements and private 
contracts of various kinds, vpould become the practice of 
the rich: that is, would become the fashion. At which 
point nothing but the achievement of economic inde- 
pendence by women, which is already seen clearly ahead 
of us, would be needed to make marriage disappear alto- 
gether, not by formal abolition, but by simple disuse. 
The private contract stage of this process was reached 
in ancient Rome. The only practicable alternative to it 
seems to be such an extension of divorce as will reduce 
the risks and obligations of marriage to a degree at 
which they will be no worse than those of the alternatives 
to marriage. As we shall see, this is the solution to 
which all the arguments tend. Meanwhile, note how 
much reason a statesman has to pause before meddling 
with an institution which, unendurable as its drawbacks 
are, threatens to come to pieces in all directions if a sin- 
gle thread of it be cut. Ibsen's similitude of the ma- 
chine-made chain stitch, which unravels the whole seam at 
the first pull when a single stitch is ripped, is very ap- 
plicable to the knot of marriage. 

Remoteness of the Facts from the Ideal 

But before we allow this to deter us from touching the 
sacred fabric, we must find out whether it is not already 
coming to pieces in all directions by the continuous strain 
of circumstances. No doubt, if it were all that it pre- 
tends to be, and human nature were working smoothly 
within its limits, there would be nothing more to be said: 
it would be let alone as it always is let alone during the 
cruder stages of civilization. But the moment we refer 
to the facts, we discover that the ideal matrimony and 
domesticity which our bigots implore us to preserve as 



Preface 157 

the corner stone of our society is a figment: what we 
have really got is something very different^ questionable 
at its best, and abominable at its worst. The word pure, 
so commonly applied to it by thoughtless people, is ab- 
surd; because if they do not mean celibate by it, they 
mean nothing; and if they do mean celibate, then mar- 
riage is legalized impurity, a conclusion which is 
offensive and inhuman. Marriage as a fact is not in 
the least like marriage as an ideal. If it were, the sud- 
den changes which have been made on the continent from 
indissoluble Roman Catholic marriage to marriage that 
can be dissolved by a box on the ear as in France, by an 
epithet as in Germany, or simply at the wish of both 
parties as in Sweden, not to mention the experiments 
made by some of the American States, would have shaken 
society to its foundations. Yet they have produced so 
little effect that Englishmen open their eyes in surprise 
when told of their existence. 

Difficulty of Obtaining Evidence 

As to what actual marriage is, one would like evidence 
instead of guesses; but as all departures from the ideal 
are regarded as disgraceful, evidence cannot be obtained; 
for when the whole community is indicted, nobody will 
go into the witness-box for the prosecution. Some 
guesses we can make with some confidence. For exam- 
ple, if it be objected to any change that our bachelors 
and widowers would no longer be Galahads, we may 
without extravagance or cynicism reply that many of 
them are not Galahads now, and that the only change 
would be that hypocrisy would no longer be compulsory. 
Indeed, this can hardly be called guessing: the evidence 
is in the streets. But when we attempt to find out the 
truth about our marriages, we cannot even guess with 
any confidence. Speaking for myself, I can say that I 



158 Getting Married 

know the inside history of perhaps half a dozen mar- 
riages. Any family solicitor knows more than this ; but 
even a family solicitor, however large his practice, knows 
nothing of the million households which have no solic- 
itors, and which nevertheless make marriage what it 
really is. And all he can say comes to no more than I 
can say: to wit, that no marriage of which I have any 
knowledge is in the least like the ideal marriage. I do 
not mean that it is worse: I mean simply that it is differ- 
ent. Also, far from society being organized in a defence 
of its ideal so jealous and implacable that the least step 
from the straight path means exposure and ruin, it is 
almost impossible by any extravagance of misconduct to 
provoke society to relax its steady pretence of blindness, 
unless you do one or both of two fatal things. One is 
to get into the newspapers ; and the other is to confess. 
If you confess misconduct to respectable men or women, 
they must either disown you or become virtually your 
accomplices : that is why they are so angry with you for 
confessing. If you get into the papers, the pretence of 
not knowing becomes impossible. But it is hardly too 
much to say that if you avoid these two perils, you can 
do anything you like, as far as your neighbors are con- 
cerned. And since we can hardly flatter ourselves that 
this is the effect of charity, it is difficult not to suspect 
that our extraordinary forbearance in the matter of stone 
throwing is that suggested in the well-known parable 
of the women taken in adultery which some early free- 
thinker slipped into the Gospel of St John : namely, that 
we all live in glass houses. We may take it, then, that 
the ideal husband and the ideal wife are no more real 
human beings than the cherubim. Possibly the great ma- 
jority keeps its marriage vows in the technical divorce 
court sense. No husband or wife yet born keeps them or 
ever can keep them in the ideal sense. 



Preface 159 

Marriage as a Magic Spell 

The truth which people seem to overlook in this matter 
is that the marriage ceremony is quite useless as a magic 
spell for changing in an instant the nature of the rela- 
tions of two human beings to one another. If a man 
marries a woman after three weeks acquaintance, and the 
day after meets a woman he has known for twenty years, 
he finds, sometimes to his own irrational surprise and 
his wife's equally irrational indignation, that his wife 
is a stranger to him, and the other woman an old friend. 
Also, there is no hocus pocus that can possibly be de- 
vized with rings and veils and vows and benedictions 
that can fix either a man's or woman's affection for 
twenty minutes, much less twenty years. Even the most 
affectionate couples must have moments during which 
they are far more conscious of one another's faults than 
of one another's attractions. There are couples who dis- 
like one another furiously for several hours at a time; 
there are couples who dislike one another permanently; 
and there are couples who never dislike one another; but 
these last are people who are incapable of disliking any- 
body. If they do not quarrel, it is not because they are 
married, but because they are not quarrelsome. The 
people who are quarrelsome quarrel with their husbands 
and wives just as easily as with their servants and rel- 
atives and acquaintances: marriage makes no difference. 
Those who talk and write and legislate as if all this 
could be prevented by making solemn vows that it shall 
not happen, are either insincere, insane, or hopelessly 
stupid. There is some sense in a contract to perform or 
abstain from actions that are reasonably within voluntary 
control ; but such contracts are only needed to provide 
against the possibility of either party being no longer de- 
sirous of the specified performance or abstention. A 
person proposing or accepting a contract not only to do 



160 Getting Married 

something but to like doing it would be certified as mad. 
Yet popular superstition credits the wedding rite with 
the power of fixing our fancies or affections for life even 
under the most unnatural conditions. 



The Impersonality of Sex 

It is necessary to lay some stress on these points, be- 
cause few realize the extent to which we proceed on the 
assumption that marriage is a short cut to perfect and 
permanent intimacy and affection. But there is a still 
more unworkable assumption which must be discarded 
before discussions of marriage can get into any sort of 
touch with the facts of life. That assumption is that the 
specific > relation which marriage authorizes between the 
parties is the most intimate and personal of human rela- 
tions, and embraces all the other high human relations. 
Now this is violently untrue. Every adult knows that 
the relation in question can and does exist between entire 
strangers, different in language, color, tastes, class, civ- 
ilization, morals, religion, character: in everything, in 
short, except their bodily homology and the reproductive 
appetite common to all living organisms. Even hatred, 
cruelty, and contempt are not incompatible with it; and 
jealousy and murder are as near to it as affectionate 
friendship. It is true that it is a relation beset with 
wildly extravagant illusions for inexperienced people, 
and that even the most experienced people have not 
always sufficient analytic faculty to disentangle it from 
the sentiments, sympathetic or abhorrent, which may 
spring up through the other relations which are com- 
pulsorily attached to it by pur laws, or sentimentally 
associated with it in romance.', But the fact remains that 
the most disastrous marriages are those founded exclu- 
sively on it, and the most successful those in which it 
has been least considered, and in which the decisive con- 



Preface 161 

siderations have had nothing to do with sex, such as 
liking, money, congeniality of tastes, similarity of hab- 
its, suitability of class, &c., &c. 

It is no doubt necessary under existing circumstances 
for a woman without property to be sexually attractive, 
because she must get married to secure a livelihood; and 
the illusions of sexual attraction will cause the imagina- 
tion of young men to endow her with every accomplish- 
ment and virtue that can make a wife a treasure. The 
attraction being thus constantly and ruthlessly used as 
a bait, both by individuals and by society, any discussion 
tending to strip it of its illusions and get at its real 
natural history is nervously discouraged. But nothing 
can well be more unwholesome for everybody than the 
exaggeration and glorification of an instinctive function 
which clouds the reason and upsets the judgment more 
than all the other instincts put together. The process 
may be pleasant and romantic; but the consequences are 
not. It would be far better for everyone, as well as far 
honester, if young people were taught that what they 
call love is an appetite which, like all other appetites, 
is destroyed for the moment by its gratification; that 
no profession, promise, or proposal made under its in- 
fluence should bind anybody; and that its great natural 
purpose so completely transcends the personal interests 
of any individual or even of any ten generations of in- 
dividuals that it should be held to be an act of prostitu- 
tion and even a sort of blasphemy to attempt to turn it 
to account by exacting a personal return for its gratifica- 
tion, whether by process of law or not. By all means 
let it be the subject of contracts with society as to its 
consequences ; but to make marriage an open trade in it 
as at present, with money, board and lodging, personal 
slavery, vows of eternal exclusive personal sentimental- 
ities and the rest of it as the price, is neither virtuous, 
dignified, nor decent. No husband ever secured his do- 



162 Getting Married 

mestic happiness and honor, nor has any wife ever se- 
cured hers, by relying on it. No private claims of any 
sort should be founded on it: the real point of honor is 
to take no corrupt advantage of it. When we hear of 
young women being led astray and the like, we find that 
what has led them astray is a sedulously inculcated false 
notion that the relation they are tempted to contract is 
so intensely personal, and the vows made under the in- 
fluence of its transient infatuation so sacred and endur- 
ing, that only an atrociously wicked man could make 
light of or forget them. What is more, as the same fan- 
tastic errors are inculcated in men, and the conscientious 
ones therefore feel bound in honor to stand by what they 
have promised, one of the surest methods to obtain a 
husband is to practise on his susceptibilities until he is 
either carried away into a promise of marriage to which 
he can be legally held, or else into an indiscretion which 
he must repair by marriage on pain of having to regard 
himself as a scoundrel and a seducer, besides facing the 
utmost damage the lady's relatives can do him. 

Such a transaction is not an entrance into a '' holy 
state of matrimony " : it is as often as not the inaugura- 
tion of a lifelong squabble, a corroding grudge, that 
causes more misery and degradation of character than a 
dozen entirely natural " desertions " and " betrayals." 
Yet the number of marriages effected more or less in this 
way must be enormous. When people say that love 
should be free, their words, taken literally, may be fool- 
ish; but they are only expressing inaccurately a very 
real need for the disentanglement of sexual relations 
from a mass of exorbitant and irrelevant conditions im- 
posed on them on false pretences to enable needy par- 
ents to get their daughters " off their hands " and to 
keep those who are already married effectually enslaved 
by one another. 



Preface 163 

The Economic Slavery of Women 

One of the consequences of basing marriage on the 
considerations stated with cold abhorrence by Saint Paul 
in the seventh chapter of his epistle to the Corinthians, 
as being made necessary by the unlikeness of most men 
to himself, is that the sex slavery involved has become 
complicated by economic slavery; so that whilst the man 
defends marriage because he is really defending his 
pleasures, the woman is even more vehement on the 
same side because she is defending her only means of 
livelihood. To a woman without property or marketable 
talent a husband is more necessary than a master to a 
dog. There is nothing more wounding to our sense of 
human dignity than the husband hunting that begins in 
every family when the daughters become marriageable; 
but it is inevitable under existing circumstances ; and the 
parents who refuse to engage in it are bad parents, 
though they may be superior individuals. The cubs of 
a humane tigress would starve; and the daughters of 
women who cannot bring themselves to devote several 
years of their lives to the pursuit of sons-in-law often 
have to expatiate their mother's squeamishness by life- 
long celibacy and indigence. To ask a young man his 
intentions when you know he has no intentions, but is 
unable to deny that he has paid attentions ; to threaten 
an action for breach of promise of marriage; to pretend 
that your daughter is a musician when she has with the 
greatest difficulty been coached into playing three piano- 
forte pieces which she loathes ; to use your own mature 
charms to attract men to the house when your daughters 
have no aptitude for that department of sport; to coach 
them, when they have, in the arts by which men can be 
led to compromize themselves ; and to keep all the skel- 
etons carefully locked up in the family cupboard until 
the prey is duly hunted down and bagged: all this is a 



164 Getting Married 

mother's duty today; and a very revolting duty it is: 
one that disposes of the conventional assumption that it 
is in the faithful discharge of her home duties that a 
woman finds her self-respect. The truth is that family 
life will never be decent, much less ennobling, until this 
central horror of the dependence of women on men is 
done away with. At present it reduces the difference 
between marriage and prostitution to the difference be- 
tween Trade Unionism and unorganized casual labor: 
a huge difference, no doubt, as to order and comfort, but 
not a difference in kind. 

However, it is not by any reform of the marriage laws 
that this can be dealt with. It is in the general move- 
ment for the prevention of destitution that the means for 
making women independent of the compulsory sale of 
their persons, in marriage or otherwise, will be found; 
but meanwhile those who deal specifically with the mar- 
riage laws should never allow themselves for a moment 
to forget this abomination that " plucks the rose from 
the fair forehead of an innocent love, and sets a blister 
there," and then calmly calls itself purity, home, mother- 
hood, respectability, honor, decency, and any other fine 
name that happens to be convenient, not to mention the 
foul epithets it hurls freely at those who are ashamed 
of it. 

Unpopularity of Impersonal Views 

Unfortunately it is very hard to make an average cit- 
izen take impersonal views of any sort in matters affect- 
ing personal comfort or conduct. We may be enthusias- 
tic Liberals or Conservatives without any hope of seats 
in Parliament, knighthoods, or posts in the Government, 
because party politics do not make the slightest differ- 
ence in our daily lives and therefore cost us nothing. 
But to take a vital process in which we are keenly inter- 



Preface 165 

ested personal instruments, and ask us to regard it, and 
feel about it, and legislate on it, wholly as if it were an 
impersonal one, is to make a higher demand than most 
people seem capable of responding to. We all have per- 
sonal interests in marriage which we are not prepared to 
sink. It is not only the women who want to get mar- 
ried: the men do too, sometimes on sentimental grounds, 
sometimes on the more sordid calculation that bachelor 
life is less comfortable and more expensive, since a wife 
pays for her status with domestic service as well as with 
the other services expected of her. Now that children 
are avoidable, this calculation is becoming more common 
and conscious than it was: a result which is regarded as 
" a steady improvement in general morality." 

Impersonality is not Promiscuity 

There is, too, a really appalling prevalence of the su- 
perstition that the sexual instinct in men is utterly pro- 
miscuous, and that the least relaxation of law and cus- 
tom must produce a wild outbreak of licentiousness. As 
far as our moralists can grasp the proposition that we 
should deal with the sexual relation as impersonal, it 
seems to them to mean that we should encourage it to be 
promiscuous : hence their recoil from it. But promis- 
cuity and impersonality are not the same thing. No 
man ever fell in love with the entire female sex, nor any 
woman with the entire male sex. We often do not fall 
in love at all; and when we do we fall in love with one 
person and remain indifferent to thousands of others who 
pass before our eyes every day. Selection, carried even 
to such fastidiousness as to induce people to say quite 
commonly that there is only one man or woman in the 
world for them, is the rule in nature. If anyone doubts 
this, let him open a shop for the sale of picture post- 
cards, and, when an enamoured lady customer demands 



166 Getting Married 

a portrait of her favorite actor or a gentleman of his 
favorite actress, try to substitute some other portrait on 
the ground that since the sexual instinct is promiscuous, 
one portrait is as pleasing as another. I suppose no 
shopkeeper has ever been foolish enough to do such a 
thing; and yet all our shopkeepers, the moment a discus- 
sion arises on marriage, will passionately argue against 
all reform on the ground that nothing but the most 
severe coercion can save their wives and daughters from 
quite indiscriminate rapine. 

Domestic Change of Air 

Our relief at the morality of the reassurance that man 
is not promiscuous in his fancies must not blind us to 
the fact that he is (to use the word coined by certain 
American writers to describe themselves) something of a 
Varietist. Even those who say there is only one man 
or woman in the world for them, find that it is not 
always the same man or woman. It happens that our 
law permits us to study this phenomenon among entirely 
law-abiding people. I know one lady who has been mar- 
ried five times. She is, as might be expected, a wise, 
attractive, and interesting woman. The question is, is 
she wise, attractive, and interesting because she has been 
married five times, or has she been married five times 
because she is wise, attractive, and interesting? Prob- 
ably some of the truth lies both ways. I also know of a 
household consisting of three families, A having married 
first B, and then C, who afterwards married D. All 
three unions were fruitful; so that the children had a 
change both of fathers and mothers. Now I cannot hon- 
estly say that these and similar cases have convinced me 
that people are the worse for a change. The lady who 
has married and managed five husbands must be much 
more expert at it than most monogamic ladies; and as a 



Preface 167 

companion and counsellor she probably leaves them no- 
where. Mr Kipling's question 

What can they know of England that only England know ? 

disposes not only of the patriots who are so patriotic that 
they never leave their own country to look at another, 
but of the citizens who are so domestic that they have 
never married again and never loved anyone except their 
own husbands and wives. The domestic doctrinaires are 
also the dull people. The impersonal relation of sex 
may be judicially reserved for one person; but any such 
reservation of friendship, affection, admiration, sympa- 
thy and so forth is only possible to a wretchedly narrow 
and jealous nature; and niether history nor contemporary 
society shews us a single amiable and respectable char- 
acter capable of it. This has always been recognized in 
cultivated society: that is why poor people accuse culti- 
vated society of profligacy, poor people being often so 
ignorant and uncultivated that they have nothing to offer 
each other but the sex relationship, and cannot conceive 
why men and women should associate for any other 
purpose. 

As to the children of the triple household, they were 
not only on excellent terms with one another, and never 
thought of any distinction between their full and their 
half brothers and sisters ; but they had the superior so- 
ciability which distinguishes the people who live in com- 
munities from those who live in small families. 

The inference is that changes of partners are not in 
themselves injurious or undesirable. People are not de- 
moralized by them when they are effected according to 
law. Therefore we need not hesitate to alter the law 
merely because the alteration would make such changes 



168 Getting Married 

Home Manners are Bad Manners 

On the other hand, we have all seen the bonds of mar- 
riage vilely abused by people who are never classed with 
shrews and wife-beaters: they are indeed sometimes held 
up as models of domesticity because they do not drink 
nor gamble nor neglect their children nor tolerate dirt 
and untidiness, and because they are not amiable enough 
to have what are called amiable weaknesses. These ter- 
rors conceive marriage as a dispensation from all the 
common civilities and delicacies which they have to ob- 
serve among strangers, or, as they put it, " before com- 
pany." And here the effects of indissoluble marriage- 
for-better-for-worse are very plainly and disagreeably 
seen. If such people took their domestic manners into 
general society, they would very soon find themselves 
without a friend or even an acquaintance in the world. 
There are women who, through total disuse, have lost the 
power of kindly human speech and can only scold and 
complain: there are men who grumble and nag from in- 
veterate habit even when they are comfortable. But 
their unfortunate spouses and children cannot escape 
from them. 



Spurious " Natural " Affection 

What is more, they are protected from even such dis- 
comfort as the dislike of his prisoners may cause to a 
gaoler by the hypnotism of the convention that the nat- 
ural relation between husband and wife and parent and 
child is one of intense affection, and that to feel any 
other sentiment towards a member of one's family is to 
be a monster. Under the influence of the emotion thus 
manufactured the most detestable people are spoilt with 
entirely undeserved deference, obedience, and even affec- 
tion whilst they live, and mourned when they die by 



Preface 169 

those whose lives they wantonly or maliciously made 
miserable. And this is what we call natural conduct. 
Nothing could well be less natural. That such a con- 
vention should have been established shews that the in- 
dissolubility of marriage creates such intolerable situa- 
tions that only by beglamoring the human imagination 
with a hypnotic suggestion of wholly unnatural feelings 
can it be made to keep up appearances. 

If the sentimental theory of family relationship en- 
courages bad manners and personal slovenliness and un- 
cleanness in the home, it also, in the case of sentimental 
people, encourages the practice of rousing and playing 
on the affections of children prematurely and far too fre- 
quently. The lady who says that as her religion is love, 
her children shall be brought up in an atmosphere 
of love_, and institutes a system of sedulous endearments 
and exchanges of presents and conscious and studied acts 
of artificial kindness, may be defeated in a large family 
by the healthy derision and rebellion of children who 
have acquired hardihood and common sense in their con- 
flicts with one another. But the small families, which 
are the rule just now, succumb more easily; and in the 
case of a single sensitive child the effect of being forced 
in a hothouse atmosphere of unnatural affection may be 
disastrous. 

In short, whichever way you take it, the convention 
that marriage and family relationship produce special 
feelings which alter the nature of human intercourse is 
a mischievous one. The whole difficulty of bringing up 
a family well is the difficulty of making its members be- 
have as considerately at home as on a visit in a strange 
house, and as frankly, kindly, and easily in a strange 
house as at home. In the middle classes, where the seg- 
regation of the artificially limited family in its little 
brick box is horribly complete, bad manners, ugly 
dresses, awkwardness, cowardice, peevishness, and all the 



170 Getting Married 

petty vices of unsociability flourish like mushrooms in a 
cellar. In the upper class, where families are not limited 
for money reasons ; where at least two houses and some- 
times three or four are the rule (not to mention the 
clubs) ; where there is travelling and hotel life ; and 
where the men are brought up, not in the family, but in 
public schools, universities, and the naval and military 
services, besides being constantly in social training in 
other people's houses, the result is to produce what may 
be called, in comparison with the middle class, something 
that might almost pass as a different and much more 
sociable species. And in the very poorest class, where 
people have no homes, only sleeping places, and conse- 
quently live practically in the streets, sociability again 
appears, leaving the middle class despised and disliked 
for its helpless and offensive unsociability as much by 
those below it as those above it, and yet ignorant enough 
to be proud of it, and to hold itself up as a model for 
the reform of the (as it considers) elegantly vicious rich 
and profligate poor alike. 

Carrying the War into the Enemy's 
Country 

Without pretending to exhaust the subject, I have 
said enough to make it clear that the moment we lose the 
desire to defend our present matrimonial and family ar- 
rangements, there will be no difficulty in making out an 
overwhelming case against them. No doubt until then 
we shall continue to hold up the British home as the 
Holy of Holies in the temple of honorable motherhood, 
innocent childhood, manly virtue, and sweet and whole- 
some national life. But with a clever turn of the hand 
this holy of holies can be exposed as an Augean stable, 
so filthy that it would seem more hopeful to burn it down 
than to attempt to sweep it out. And this latter view 



Preface 171 

will perhaps prevail if the idolaters of marriage persist 
in refusing all proposals for reform and treating those 
who advocate it as infamous delinquents. Neither view 
is of any use except as a poisoned arrow in a fierce fight 
between two parties determined to discredit each other 
with a view to obtaining powers of legal coercion over 
one another. 

Shelley and Queen Victoria 

The best way to avert such a struggle is to open the 
eyes of the thoughtlessly conventional people to the 
weakness of their position in a mere contest of recrim- 
ination. Hitherto they have assumed that they have the 
advantage of coming into the field without a stain on 
their characters to combat libertines who have no charac- 
ter at all. They conceive it to be their duty to throw 
mud ; and they feel that even if the enemy can find any 
mud to throw, none of it will stick. They are mistaken. 
There will be plenty of that sort of ammunition in the 
other camp; and most of it will stick very hard indeed. 
The moral is, do not throw any. If we can imagine 
Shelley and Queen Victoria arguing out their differences 
in another world, we may be sure that the Queen has 
long ago found that she cannot settle the question by 
classing Shelley with George IV. as a bad man; and 
Shelley is not likely to have called her vile names on 
the general ground that as the economic dependence of 
women makes marriage a money bargain in which the 
man is the purchaser and the woman the purchased, there 
is no essential difference between a married woman and 
the woman of the streets. Unfortunately, all the people 
whose methods of controversy are represented by our 
popular newspapers are not Queen Victorias and Shel- 
leys. A great mass of them, when their prejudices are 
challenged, have no other impulse than to call the chal- 



172 Getting Married 

lenger names, and, when the crowd seems to be on their 
side, to maltreat him personally or hand him over to the 
law, if he is vulnerable to it. Therefore I cannot say 
that I have any certainty that the marriage question will 
be dealt with decently and tolerantly. But dealt with 
it will be, decently or indecently; for the present state 
of things in England is too strained and mischievous to 
last. Europe and America have left us a century behind 
in this matter. 

A Probable Effect of Giving Women the 
Vote 

The political emancipation of women is likely to lead 
to a comparatively stringent enforcement by law of 
sexual morality (that is why so many of us dread it) ; 
and this will soon compel us to consider what our sexual 
morality shall be. At present a ridiculous distinction is 
made between vice and crime, in order that men may be 
vicious with impunity. Adultery, for instance, though 
it is sometimes fiercely punished by giving an injured 
husband crushing damages in a divorce suit (injured 
wives are not considered in this way), is not now di- 
rectly prosecuted; and this impunity extends to illicit 
relations between unmarried persons who have reached 
what is called the age of consent. There are other mat- 
ters, such as notification of contagious disease and solic- 
itation, in which the hand of the law has been brought 
down on one sex only. Outrages which were capital 
offences within the memory of persons still living when 
committed on women outside marriage, can still be in- 
flicted by men on their wives without legal remedy. At 
all such points the code will be screwed up by the opera- 
tion of Votes for Women, if there be any virtue in the 
franchise at all. The result will be that men will find 
the more ascetic side of our sexual morality taken seri- 



Preface 173 

ously by the law. It is easy to foresee the consequences. 
No man will take much trouble to alter laws which he 
can evade^ or which are either not enforced or enforced 
on women only. But when these laws take him by the 
collar and thrust him into prison, he suddenly becomes 
keenly critical of them, and of the arguments by which 
they are supported. Now we have seen that our mar- 
riage laws will not stand criticism, and that they have 
held out so far only because they are so worked as to fit 
roughly our state of society, in which women are neither 
politically nor personally free, in which indeed women 
are called womanly only when they regard themselves as 
existing solely for the use of men. When Liberalism en- 
franchises them politically, and Socialism emancipates 
them economically, they will no longer allow the law to 
take immorality so easily. Both men and women will be 
forced to behave morally in sex matters ; and when they 
find that this is inevitable they will raise the question 
of what behavior really should be established as moral. 
If they decide in favor of our present professed morality, 
they will have to make a revolutionary change in their 
habits by becoming in fact what they only pretend to be 
at present. If, on the other hand, they find that this 
would be an luibearable tyranny, without even the excuse 
of justice or sound eugenics, they will reconsider their 
morality and remodel the law. 

The Personal Sentimental Basis of- 
Monogamy 

Monogamy has a sentimental basis which is quite dis- 
tinct from the political one of equal numbers of the 
sexes. Equal numbers in the sexes are quite compatible 
with a change of partners every day or every hour. 
Physically there is nothing to distinguish human society 
from the farm-yard except that children are more 



174 Getting Married 

troublesome and costly than chickens and calves, and 
that men and women are not so completely enslaved as 
farm stock. Accordingly, the people whose conception 
of marriage is a farm-yard or slave-quarter conception 
are always more or less in a panic lest the slightest re- 
laxation of the marriage laws should utterly demoralize 
society; whilst those to whom marriage is a matter of 
more highly evolved sentiments and needs (sometimes 
said to be distinctively human, though birds and animals 
in a state of freedom evince them quite as touchingly as 
we) are much more liberal, knowing as they do that 
monogamy will take care of itself provided the parties 
are free enough, and that promiscuity is a product of 
slavery and not of liberty. 

The solid foundation of their confidence is the fact 
tliat the relationship set up by a comfortable marriage 
is so intimate and so persuasive of the whole life of the 
parties to it, that nobody has room in his or her life 
for more than one such relationship at a time. What is 
called a household of three is never really of three except 
in the sense that every household becomes a household 
of three when a child is born, and may in the same way 
become a household of four or fourteen if the union be 
fertile enough. Now no doubt the marriage tie means 
so little to some people that the addition to the house- 
hold of half a dozen more wives or husbands would be 
as possible as the addition of half a dozen governesses 
or tutors or visitors or servants. A Sultan may have 
fifty wives as easily as he may have fifty dishes on his 
table, because in the English sense he has no wives at 
all; nor have his wives any husband: in short, he is not 
what we call a married man. And there are sultans and 
sultanas and seraglios existing in England under Eng- 
lish forms. But when you come to the real modern mar- 
riage of sentiment, a relation is created which has never 
to my knowledge been shared by three persons except 



Preface 175 

when all three have been extraordinarily fond of one 
another. Take for example the famous case of Nelson 
and Sir William and Lady Hamilton. The secret of 
this household of three was not only that both the hus- 
band and Nelson were devoted to Lady Hamilton, but 
that they were also apparently devoted to one another. 
When Hamilton died both Nelson and Emma seem to 
have been equally heartbroken. When there is a success- 
ful household of one man and two women the same un- 
usual condition is fulfilled: the two women not only can- 
not live happily without the man but cannot live happily 
without each other. In every other case known to me, 
either from observation or record, the experiment is a 
hopeless failure: one of the two rivals for the really in- 
timate affection of the third inevitably drives out the 
other. The driven-out party may accept the situation 
and remain in the house as a friend to save appearances, 
or for the sake of the children, or for economic reasons ; 
but such an arrangement can subsist only when the for- 
feited relation is no longer really valued; and this in- 
difference, like the triple bond of affection which carried 
Sir William Hamilton through, is so rare as to be prac- 
ticably negligible in the establishment of a conventional 
morality of marriage. Therefore sensible and experi- 
enced people always assume that when a declaration of 
love is made to an already married person, the declara-- 
tion binds the parties in honor never to see one another 
again unless they contemplate divorce and remarriage. 
And this is a sound convention, even for unconventional 
people. Let me illustrate by reference to a fictitious 
case: the one imagined in my own play Candida will do 
as well as another. Here a young man who has been 
received as a friend into the house of a clergyman falls 
in love with the clergyman's wife, and, being young and 
inexperienced, declares his feelings, and claims that he, 
and not the clergyman, is the more suitable mate for the 



176 Getting Married 

lady. The clergyman^ who has a temper, is first tempted 
to hurl the youth into the street by bodily violence: an 
impulse natural, perhaps, but vulgar and improper, and 
not open, on consideration, to decent men. Even coarse 
and inconsiderate men are restrained from it by the fact 
that the sympathy of the woman turns naturally to the 
victim of physical brutality and against the bully, the 
Thackerayan notion to the contrary being one of the 
illusions of literary masculinity. Besides, the husband 
is not necessarily the stronger man: an apjDcal to force 
has resulted in the ignominious defeat of the husband 
quite as often as in poetic justice as conceived in the 
conventional novelet. What an honorable and sensible 
man does when his household is invaded is what the Rev- 
erend James Mavor Morell does in my play. He recog- 
nizes that just as there is not room for two women in 
that sacredly intimate relation of sentimental domesticity 
which is what marriage means to him, so there is no 
room for two men in that relation with his wife; and he 
accordingly tells her firmly that she must choose which 
man will occupy the place that is large enough for one 
only. He is so far shrewdly unconventional as to rec- 
ognize that if she chooses the other man, he must give 
way, legal tie or no legal tie; but he knows that either 
one or the other must go. And a sensible wife would 
act in the same way. If a romantic young lady came into 
her house and proposed to adore her husband on a tol- 
erated footing, she would say " My husband has not 
room in his life for two wives: either you go out of the 
house or I go out of it." The situation is not at all un- 
likely: I had almost said not at all unusual. Young 
ladies and gentlemen in the greensickly condition which 
is called calf-love, associating with married couples at 
dangerous periods of mature life, quite often find them- 
selves in it; and the extreme reluctance of proud and 
sensitive people to avoid any assertion of matrimonial 



Preface 177 

rights, or to condescend to jealousy, sometimes makes 
the threatened husband or wife hesitate to take prompt 
steps and do the apparently conventional thing. But 
whether they hesitate or act the result is always the 
same. In a real marriage of sentiment the wife or hus- 
band cannot be supplanted by halves; and such a mar- 
riage will break very soon under the strain of polygyny 
or polyandry. What we want at present is a sufficiently 
clear teaching of this fact to ensure that prompt and 
decisive action shall always be taken in such cases with- 
out any false shame of seeming conventional (a shame to 
which people capable of such real marriage are specially 
susceptible), and a rational divorce law to enable the 
marriage to be dissolved and the parties honorably re- 
sorted and recoupled without disgrace and scandal if 
that should prove the proper solution. 

It must be repeated here that no law, however strin- 
gent, can prevent polygamy among groups of people who 
choose to live loosely and be monogamous only in ap- 
pearance. But such cases are not now under considera- 
tion. Also, affectionate husbands like Samuel Pepys, and 
affectionate wives of the corresponding temperament, 
may, it appears, engage in transient casual adventures 
out of doors without breaking up their home life. But 
within doors that home life may be regarded as naturally 
monogamous. It does not need to be protected against 
polygamy: it protects itself. 

Divorce 

All this has an important bearing on the question of 
divorce. Divorce reformers are so much preoccupied 
with the injustice of forbidding a woman to divorce her 
husband for unfaithfulness to his marriage vow, whilst 
allowing him that power over her, that they are apt to 
overlook the pressing need for admitting other and far 



178 Getting Married 

more important grounds for divorce. If we take a docu- 
ment like Pepys' Diary, we learn that a woman may have 
an incorrigibly unfaithful husband, and yet be much bet- 
ter off than if she had an ill-tempered, peevish, mali- 
ciously sarcastic one, or was chained for life to a crimi- 
nal, a drunkard, a lunatic, an idle vagrant, or a person 
whose religious faith was contrary to her own. Imagine 
being married to a liar, a borrower, a mischief maker, a 
teaser or tormentor of children and animals, or even sim- 
ply to a bore ! Conceive yourself tied for life to one of 
the perfectly " faithful " husbands who are sentenced to 
a month's imprisonment occasionally for idly leaving 
their wives in childbirth without food, fire, or attendance ! 
What woman would not rather marry ten Pepyses ? what 
man a dozen Nell Gwynnes.'' Adultery, far from being 
the first and only ground for divorce, might more reason- 
ably be made the last, or wholly excluded. The present 
law is perfectly logical only if you once admit (as no 
decent person ever does) its fundamental assumption 
that there can be no companionship between men and 
women because the woman has a " sphere " of her own, 
that of housekeeping, in which the man must not meddle, 
whilst he has all the rest of human activity for his 
sphere: the only point at which the two spheres touch 
being that of replenishing the population. On this as- 
sumption the man naturally asks for a guarantee that the 
children shall be his because he has to find the money to 
support them. The power of divorcing a woman for 
adultery is this guarantee, a guarantee that she does not 
need to protect her against a similar imposture on his 
part, because he cannot bear children. No doubt he can 
spend the money that ought to be spent on her children 
on another woman and her children ; but this is desertion, 
which is a separate matter. The fact for us to seize is 
that in the eye of the law, adultery without consequences 
is merely a sentimental grievance, whereas the planting 



Preface 179 

on one man of another man's offspring is a substantial 
one. And so, no doubt, it is ; but the day has gone by for 
basing laws on the assumption that a woman is less to 
a man than his dog, and thereby encouraging and accept- 
ing the standards of the husbands who buy meat for their 
bull-pups and leave their wives and children hungry. 
That basis is the penalty we pay for having borrowed 
our religion from the East, instead of building up a re- 
ligion of our own out of our western inspiration and west- 
ern sentiment. The result is that we all believe that our 
religion is on its last legs, whereas the truth is that it is 
not yet born, though the age walks visibly pregnant with 
it. Meanwhile, as women are dragged down by their ori- 
ental servitude to our men, and as, further, women drag 
down those who degrade them quite as effectually as men 
do, there are moments when it is difficult to see anything 
in our sex institutions except a police des moeurs keeping 
the field for a competition as to which sex shall corrupt 
the other most. 

Importance of Sentimental Grievances 

Any tolerable western divorce law must put the senti- 
mental grievances first, and should carefully avoid sing- 
ling out any ground of divorce in such a way as to cre- 
ate a convention that persons having that ground are 
bound in honor to avail themselves of it. It is generally 
admitted that people should not be encouraged to petition 
for a divorce in a fit of petulance. What is not so clearly 
seen is that neither should they be encouraged to petition 
in a fit of jealousy, which is certainly the most detest- 
able and mischievous of all the passions that enjoy pub- 
lic credit. Still less should people who are not jealous 
be urged to behave as if they were jealous, and to enter 
upon duels and divorce suits in which they have no de- 
sire to be successful. There should be no publication of 



180 Getting Married 

the grounds on which a divorce is sought or granted ; and 
as this would abolish the only means the public now has 
of ascertaining that every possible effort has been made 
to keep the couple united against their wills, such pri- 
vacy will only be tolerated when we at last admit that 
the sole and sufficient reason why people should be 
granted a divorce is that they want one. Then there will 
be no more reports of divorce cases, no more letters read 
in court with an indelicacy that makes every sensitive 
person shudder and recoil as from a profanation, no more 
washing of household linen, dirty or clean, in public. 
We must learn in these matters to mind our own business 
and not impose our individual notions of propriety on one 
another, even if it carries us to the length of openly ad- 
mitting what we are now compelled to assume silently, 
that every human being has a right to sexual experience, 
and that the law is concerned only with parentage, which 
is now a separate matter. 



Divorce Without Asking Why 

The one question that should never be put to a peti- 
tioner for divorce is " Why? " When a man appeals to 
a magistrate for protection from someone who threatens 
to kill him, on the simple ground that he desires to live, 
the magistrate might quite reasonably ask him why he 
desires to live, and why the person who wishes to kill him 
should not be gratified. Also whether he can prove that 
his life is a pleasure to himself or a benefit to anyone 
else, and whether it is good for him to be encouraged to 
exaggerate the importance of his short span in this vale 
of tears rather than to keep himself constantly ready to 
meet his God. 

The only reason for not raising these very weighty 
points is that we find society unworkable except on the 



Preface 181 

assumption that every man has a natural right to live. 
Nothing short of his own refusal to respect that right in 
others can reconcile the community to killing him. From 
this fundamental right many others are derived. The 
American Constitution, one of the few modern political 
documents drawn up by men who were forced by the 
sternest circumstances to think out what they really had 
to face instead of chopping logic in a university class- 
room, specifies " liberty and the pursuit of happiness " 
as natural rights. The terms are too vague to be of much 
practical use; for the supreme right to life, extended as 
it now must be to the life of the race, and to the quality 
of life as well as to the mere fact of breathing, is making 
short work of many ancient liberties, and exposing the 
pursuit of happiness as perhaps the most miserable of 
human occupations. Nevertheless, the American Con- 
stitution roughly expresses the conditions to which mod- 
ern democracy commits us. To impose marriage on two 
unmarried people who do not desire to marry one an- 
other would be admittedly an act of enslavement. But 
it is no worse than to impose a continuation of marriage 
on people who have ceased to desire to be married. It 
will be said that the parties may not agree on that; that 
one may desire to maintain the marriage the other wishes 
to dissolve. But the same hardship arises whenever a 
man in love proposes marriage to a woman and is re- 
fused. The refusal is so painful to him that he often 
threatens to kill himself and sometimes even does it. 
Yet we expect him to face his ill luck, and never dream 
of forcing the woman to accept him. His case is the 
same as that of the husband whose wife tells him she no 
longer cares for him, and desires the marriage to be 
dissolved. You will say, perhaps, if you are supersti- 
tious, that it is not the same — that marriage makes a 
difference. You are wrong: there is no magic in mar- 
riage. If there were, married couples would never de- 



182 Getting Married 

sire to separate. But they do. And when they do, it 
is simple slavery to compel them to remain together. 

Economic Slavery Again the Root 

Difficulty 

The husband, then, is to be allowed to discard his wife 
when he is tired of her, and the wife the husband when 
another man strikes her fancy? One must reply unhesi- 
tatingly in the affirmative; for if we are to deny every 
proposition that can be stated in offensive terms by its 
opponents, we shall never be able to affirm anything at 
all. But the question reminds us that until the economic 
independence of women is achieved, we shall have to re- 
main impaled on the other horn of the dilemma and 
maintain marriage as a slavery. And here let me ask the 
Government of the day (I9IO) a question with regard 
to the Labor Exchanges it has very wisely established 
throughout the country. What do these Exchanges do 
when a woman enters and states that her occupation is 
that of a wife and mother; that she is out of a job; and 
that she wants an employer.'' If the Exchanges refuse 
to entertain her application, they are clearly excluding 
nearly the whole female sex from the benefit of the Act. 
If not, they must become matrimonial agencies, unless, 
indeed, they are prepared to become something worse by 
putting the woman down as a housekeeper and introduc- 
ing her to an employer without making marriage a con- 
dition of the hiring. 

Labor Exchanges and the White Slavery 

Suppose, again, a woman presents herself at the Labor 
Exchange, and states her trade as that of a White Slave, 
meaning the unmentionable trade pursued by many 
thousands of women in all civilized cities. Will the 



Preface 183 

Labor Exchange find employers for her? If not, what 
will it do with her? If it throws her back destitute and 
unhelped on the streets to starve, it might as well not 
exist as far as she is concerned; and the problem of un- 
employment remains unsolved at its most painful point- 
Yet if it finds honest employment for her and for all the 
unemployed wives and mothers, it must find new places 
in the world for women ; and in so doing it must achieve 
for them economic independence of men. And when 
this is done, can we feel sure that any woman will con- 
sent to be a wife and mother (not to mention the less re- 
spectable alternative) unless her position is made as eli- 
gible as that of the women for whom the Labor Ex- 
changes are finding independent work? Will not many 
women now engaged in domestic work under circum- 
stances which make it repugnant to them, abandon it and 
seek employment under other circumstances ? As xmhap- 
piness in marriage is almost the only discomfort sufii- 
ciently irksome to induce a woman to break up her home, 
and economic dependence the only compulsion sufficiently 
stringent to force her to endure such unhappiness, the 
solution of the problem of finding independent employ- 
ment for women may cause a great number of childless 
unhappy marriages to break up spontaneously, whether 
the marriage laws are altered or not. And here we must 
extend the term childless marriages to cover households 
in which the children have grown up and gone their own 
way, leaving the parents alone together: a point at 
which many worthy couples discover for the first time 
that they have long since lost interest in one another, 
and have been united only by a common interest in their 
children. We may expect, then, that marriages which 
are maintained by economic pressure alone will dissolve 
when that pressure is removed; and as all the parties to 
them will certainly not accept a celibate life, the law 
must sanction the dissolution in order to prevent a recur- 



184 Getting Married 

rence of the scandal which has moved the Government 
to appoint the Commission now sitting to investigate the 
marriage question : the scandal, that is, of a great number 
of persons, condemned to celibacy by magisterial sepa- 
ration orders, and, of course, refusing to submit to the 
condemnation, forming illicit connections to an extent 
which threatens to familiarize the working classes with 
an open disuse of marriage. In short, once set women 
free from their economic slavery, and you will find that 
unless divorce is made as easy as the dissolution of a 
business partnership, the practice of dispensing with 
marriage will presently become so common that conven- 
tional couples will be ashamed to get married. 

Divorce Favorable to Marriage 

Divorce, in fact, is not the destruction of marriage, 
but the first condition of its maintenance. A thousand 
indissoluble marriages mean a thousand marriages and 
no more. A thousand divorces may mean two thousand 
marriages ; for the couples may marry again. Divorce 
only re-assorts the couples : a very desirable thing when 
they are ill-assorted. Also, it makes people much more 
willing to marry, especially prudent people and proud 
people with a high sense of self-respect. Further, the 
fact that a divorce is possible often prevents its being 
petitioned for, not only because it puts married couples 
on their good behavior towards one another, but because, 
as no room feels like a prison if the door is left open, the 
removal of the sense of bondage would at once make mar- 
riage much happier than it is now. Also, if the door 
were always open, there would be no need to rush 
through it as there is now when it opens for one moment 
in a lifetime, and may never open again. 

From this point of view England has the worst civil 
marriage law in the world, with the exception of silly 



i 



Preface 185 

South Carolina. In every other reasonably civilized 
country the grounds on which divorce can be granted ad- 
mit of so wide an interpretation that all unhappy mar- 
riages can be dissolved without resorting to the shameful 
shifts imposed by our law. Yet the figures just given 
to the Royal Commission shew that in the State of Wash- 
ington, where there are eleven different grounds of di- 
vorce, and where, in fact, divorce can be had for the 
asking at a negligible cost, the divorce rate is only 184 
per 100,000 of the population, which, if we assume that 
the 100,000 people represent 20,000 families, means less 
than one per cent of domestic failures. In Japan the 
rate is 215, which is said to be the highest on record. 
This is not very alarming: what is quite hideous is that 
the rate in England is only 2, a figure which, if we as- 
sume that human nature is much the same in Walworth 
as in Washington, must represent a frightful quantity 
of useless unhappiness and clandestine polygamy. I am 
not forgetting my own demonstration that the rate is 
kept down in Washington by the economic slavery of 
women; but I must point out that this is at its worst in 
the middle classes only, because a woman of the working 
class can turn to and support herself, however poorly; 
and a woman of the upper classes usually has some prop- 
erty. And in all classes we may guess that the object 
of many divorces is not the resumption of a single life, 
but a change of partners. As this change can be effected 
easily under the existing law in the State of Washington 
it is not certain that the economic emancipation of women 
would alter the rate there to any startling extent. What 
is certain is that it could not conceivably raise it to a 
figure at which even the most panicky alarmist could 
persuade sensible people that the whole social fabric was 
tumbling to pieces. When journalists and bishops and 
American Presidents and other simple people describe 
this Washington result as alarming, they are speaking 



186 Getting Married 

as a peasant speaks of a motor car or an aeroplane when 
he sees one for the first time. All he means is that he 
is not used to it and therefore fears that it may injure 
him. Every advance in civilization frightens these hon- 
est folk. This is a pity; but if we were to spare their 
feelings we should never improve the world at all. To 
let them frighten us, and then pretend that their stupid 
timidity is virtue and purity and so forth, is simply 
moral cowardice. 

Male Economic Slavery and The Rights of 
Bachelors 

It must not be forgotten that the refusal to accept the 
indignities, risks, hardships, softships, and divided du- 
ties of marriage is not confined to our voluntary old 
maids. There are men of the mould of Beethoven and 
Samuel Butler, whom one can hardly conceive as mar- 
ried men. There are the great ecclesiastics, who will 
not own two loyalties: one to the Church and one to the 
hearth. There are men like Goethe, who marry late 
and reluctantly solely because they feel that they can- 
not in honest friendship refuse the status of marriage 
to any woman of whose attachment to them they have 
taken any compromizing advantage, either in fact or in 
appearance. No sensible man can, under existing cir- 
cumstances, advise a woman to keep house with a man 
without insisting on his marrying her, unless she is in- 
dependent of conventional society (a state of things 
which can occur only very exceptionally) ; and a man 
of honor cannot advise a woman to do for his sake what 
he would not advise her to do for anyone else's. The 
result is that our Beethovens and Butlers — of whom, in 
their ordinary human aspect, there are a good many — 
become barren old bachelors, and rather savage ones at 
that. 



Preface 187 

Another difficulty which we always think of in connec- 
tion with women, but which is by no means without its 
application to men, is the economic one. The number of 
men who cannot afford to marry is large enough to pro- 
duce very serious social results; and the higher the work 
the man is doing, the more likely he is to find himself 
in this class until he has reached or passed middle age. 
The higher departments of science, law, philosophy, 
poetry, and the fine arts are notoriously starved in youth 
and early manhood: the marriageable age there, econom- 
ically speaking, is nearer fifty than twenty. Even in 
business the leading spirits seldom reach a position of 
security until they are far beyond the age at which cel- 
ibacy is tolerable. Account must also be taken of the 
younger sons of the propertied classes, brought up in 
households in which the rate of expenditure, though ten 
times that possible on a younger son's portion, yet rep- 
resents the only habit of life he has learnt. 

Taking all these cases as representing a bachelor class, 
and bearing in mind that though a man who marries at 
forty is not called a bachelor, yet he has for twenty years 
of his adult life been one, and therefore produced all the 
social problems that arise out of the existence of unmar- 
ried men, we must not shrink from asking whether all 
these gentlemen are celibates, even though we know that 
the question must be answered very emphatically in the 
negative. Some of them marry women of property, 
thereby reproducing the economic dependence of women 
on men with the sexes reversed. But there are so few 
women of property available for this purpose in com- 
parison with the number of bachelors who cannot afford 
to marry, that this resource does not solve the problem 
of the bachelor who cannot afford a wife. If there were 
no other resources available, bachelors would make love 
to the wives and daughters of their friends. This being 
morally inadmissible, a demand arises for a cheap tem- 



188 Getting Married 

porary substitute for marriage. A class of women must 
be found to protect the wives and the daughters of the 
married by keeping company with the bachelors for hire 
for as long or as short a time as the bachelor can afford, 
on the understanding that no claim is to be made on him 
after the hiring is ended. And such an institution, as 
we know, exists among us. It is commonly spoken of 
and thought of as an offence against our marriage moral- 
ity; but all the experts who write scientific treatises on 
marriage seem to be agreed that it is, on the contrary, a 
necessary part of that morality, and must stand and fall 
with it. 

I do not myself think that this view will bear exam- 
ination. In my play, Mrs Warren's Profession, I have 
shewn that the institution in question is an economic 
phenomenon, produced by our underpayment and ill- 
treatment of women who try to earn an honest living. I 
am aware that for some reason scientific writers are per- 
versely impatient of this view, and, to discredit it, quote 
police lists of the reasons given by the victims for adopt- 
ing their trade, and insist on the fact that poverty is not 
often alleged. But this means only that the actual word 
is seldom used. If a prisonful of thieves were asked 
what induced them to take to thieving, and some replied 
Poverty, and others Hunger, and others Desire for Ex- 
citement, no one would deny that the three answers were 
really one answer — that poverty means hunger, an in- 
tolerable lack of variety and pleasure, and, in short, all 
sorts of privations. When a girl, similarly interro- 
gated, says she wanted fine clothes, or more fun, or the 
like, she is really saying that she lacked what no woman 
with plenty of money need lack. The fact that, accord- 
ing to the testimony of men who profess experience in 
such matters, you may search Europe in vain for a 
woman in this trade who has the table manners of a lady, 
shews that prostitution is not a vocation but a slavery 



Preface 189 

to which women are driven by the miseries of honest 
poverty. When every young woman has an honorable 
and comfortable livelihood open to her on reasonable 
terms, the streets will make no more recruits. When 
every young man can afford to marry, and marriage re- 
form makes it easy to dissolve unions contracted by 
young and inexperienced people in the event of their 
turning out badly, or of one of the pair achieving a po- 
sition neither comfortable nor suitable for the other, both 
prostitution and bachelordom will die a natural death. 
Until then, all talk of " purification " is idle. It is for 
that reason, and also because they have been so fully 
dealt with by Havelock Ellis and numerous foreign writ- 
ers on the psychology and physiology of sex, that I lay 
little stress on prostitution here. 

The Pathology of Marriage 

I shall also say as little as possible of the pathology 
of marriage and its kerbstone breakwater. Only, as 
there seems to be no bottom to the abyss of public ig- 
norance on the subject, I am compelled to warn my read- 
ers that marriage has a pathology and even a criminol- 
ogy. But they are both so frightful that they have been 
dealt with not only in such treatises as those of Havelock, 
Ellis, Fournier, Duclaux, and many German writers, but 
in such comparatively popular works as The Heavenly 
Twins by Sarah Grand, and several of the plays of 
Brieux: notably Les Avaries, Les Trois Filles de M. 
Dupont, and Maternite. I purposely pass them by 
quickly, not only because attention has already been 
called to them by these devoted writers, but because my 
mission is not to deal with obvious horrors, but to open 
the eyes of normal respectable men to evils which are 
escaping their consideration. 

As to the evils of disease and contagion, our con- 



190 Getting Married 

sciences are sound enough: what is wrong with us is ig- 
norance of the facts. No doubt this is a very formidable 
ignorance in a country where the first cry of the soul is 
" Dont tell me : I dont want to know," and where frantic 
denials and furious suppressions indicate everywhere the 
cowardice and want of faith which conceives life as 
something too terrible to be faced. In this particular 
ease " I dont want to know " takes a righteous air, and 
becomes " I dont want to know anything about the dis- 
eases which are the just punishment of wretches who 
should not be mentioned in my presence or in any book 
that is intended for family reading." Wicked and fool- 
ish as the spirit of this attitude is, the practice of it is 
so easy and lazy and uppish that it is very common. 
But its cry is drowned by a louder and more sincere one. 
We who do not want to know also do not want to go 
blind, to go mad, to be disfigured, to be barren, to be- 
come pestiferous, or to see such things happening to our 
children. We learn, at last, that the majority of the 
victims are not the people of whom we so glibly say 
" Serve them right," but quite innocent children and in- 
nocent parents, smitten by a contagion which, no matter 
in what vice it may or may not have originated, con- 
taminates the innocent and the guilty alike once it is 
launched exactly as any other contagious disease does; 
that indeed it often hits the innocent and misses the 
guilty because the guilty know the danger and take 
elaborate precautions against it, whilst the innocent, who 
have been either carefully kept from any knowledge of 
their danger, or erroneously led to believe that contagion 
is possible through misconduct only, run into danger 
blindfold. Once knock this fact into people's minds, 
and their self-righteous indifference and intolerance soon 
change into lively concern for themselves and their fam- 
ilies. 



Preface 191 

The Criminology of Marriage 

The pathology of marriage involves the possibility of 
the most horrible crime imaginable: that of the person 
who, when suffering from contagious disease, forces the 
contagion on another person by an act of violence. Such 
an act occurring between unmarried people would, within 
the memory of persons now living, have exposed the ag- 
gressor to the penalty of death; and it is still punished 
unmercifully by an extreme term of penal servitude 
when it occurs, as it sometimes does, through the hideous 
countryside superstition that it effects a cure when the 
victim is a virgin. Marriage makes this outrage abso- 
lutely legal. You may with impunity do to the person 
to whom you are married what you may not do to the 
most despised outcast of the streets. And this is only 
the extreme instance of the outlawry which our marriage 
laws effect. In our anxiety to provide for ourselves a 
little private Alsatia in which we can indulge ourselves 
as we please without reproach or interference from law, 
religion, or even conscience (and this is what marriage 
has come to mean to many of us), we have forgotten that 
we cannot escape restraints without foregoing rights; 
that all the laws that are needed to compel strangers to 
respect us are equally if not more necessary to compel 
our husbands and wives to respect us ; and that society 
without law, whether between two or two million per- 
sons, means tyranny and slavery. 

If the incorrigible sentimentalists here raise their little 
pipe of " Not if they love one another," I tell them, with 
such patience as is possible, that if they had ever had 
five minutes experience of love they would know that love 
is itself a tyranny requiring special safeguards ; that 
people will perpetrate " for the sake of " those they love, 
exactions and submissions that they would never dream 
of proposing to or suffering from those they dislike or 



192 Getting Married 

regard with indifference; that healthy marriages are 
partnerships of companionable and affectionate friend- 
ship; that cases of chronic life-long love, whether senti- 
mental or sensual, ought to be sent to the doctor if not 
to the executioner; and that honorable men and women, 
when their circumstances permit it, are so far from 
desiring to be placed helplessly at one another's mercy 
that they employ every device the law now admits of, 
from the most stringent marriage settlements to the em- 
ployment of separate legal advisers, to neutralize the 
Alsatian evils of the marriage law. 

Does it Matter? 

A less obviously silly evasion, and one which has a 
greater air of common sense, is " After all, seeing that 
most couples get on very well together, does it matter 
so much ? " The same reply might be made by a lazy 
magistrate when asked for a warrant to arrest a burglar, 
or by a sleepy fireman wakened by a midnight call for 
his fire-escape. " After all, very few people have their 
houses broken into; and fewer still have them burnt. 
Does it matter ? " But tell the magistrate or fireman 
that it is his house that has been broken into, or his house 
that has been burnt, and you will be startled by the 
change in his attitude. Because a mass of people have 
shaken down into comfort enough to satisfy them, or 
at least to cause them no more discomfort than they are 
prepared to put up with for the sake of a quiet life, less 
lucky and more sensitive and conscientious people should 
not be condemned to expose themselves to intolerable 
wrongs. Besides, people ought not to be content with 
the marriage law as it is merely because it is not often 
unbearably uncomfortable. Slaves are very often much 
more comfortable both in body and mind than fully re- 
sponsible free men. That does not excuse anybody for 



4 



Preface 193 

embracing slavery. It is no doubt a great pity, from 
many points of view, that we were not conquered by 
Napoleon, or even by Bismarck and Moltke. None the 
less we should have been rightly despised if we had not 
been prepared to fight them for the right to misgovern 
ourselves. 

But, as I have said, I am content, in this matter of 
the evils of our marriage law, to take care of the pence 
and let the pounds take care of themselves. The crimes 
and diseases of marriage will force themselves on public 
attention by their own virulence. I mention them here 
only because they reveal certain habits of thought and 
feeling with regard to marriage of which we must rid 
ourselves if we are to act sensibly when we take the nec- 
essary reforms in hand. 

Christian Marriage 

First among these is the habit of allowing ourselves 
to be bound not only by the truths of the Christian re- 
ligion but by the excesses and extravagances which the 
Christian movement acquired in its earlier da5's as a vio- 
lent reaction against what it still calls paganism. By far 
the most dangerous of these, because it is a blasphemy 
against life, and, to put it in Christian terms, an accusa- 
tion of indecency against God, is the notion that sex, 
with all its operations, is in itself absolutely an obscene 
thing, and that an immaculate conception is a miracle. 
So unwholesome an absurdity could only have gained 
ground under two conditions : one, a reaction against a 
society in which sensual luxury had been carried to re- 
volting extremes, and, two, a belief that the world was 
coming to an end, and that therefore sex was no longer 
a necessity. Christianity, because it began under these 
conditions, made sexlessness and Communism the two 
main practical articles of its propaganda; and it has 



194 Getting Married , 

never quite lost its original bias in these directions. In 
spite of the putting off of the Second Coming from the 
lifetime of the apostles to the millennium, and of the 
great disappointment of the year 1000 a.d., in which 
multitudes of Christians seriously prepared for the end 
of the world, the prophet who announces that the end is 
at hand is still popular. Many of the people who ridi- 
cule his demonstrations that the fantastic monsters of 
the book of Revelation are among us in the persons of 
our own political contemporaries, and who proceed sanely 
in all their affairs on the assumption that the world is 
going to last, really do believe that there will be a Judg- 
ment Day, and that it might even be in their own time. 
A thunderstorm, an eclipse, or any very unusual weather 
will make them apprehensive and uncomfortable. 

This explains why, for a long time, the Christian 
Church refused to have anything to do with marriage. 
The result was, not the abolition of sex, but its excom- 
munication. And, of course, the consequences of per- 
suading people that matrimony was an unholy state were 
so grossly carnal, that the Church had to execute a com- 
plete right-about-face, and try to make people under- 
stand that it was a holy state : so holy indeed that it could 
not be validly inaugurated without the blessing of the 
Church. And by this teaching it did something to atone 
for its earlier blasphemy. But the mischief of chopping 
and changing your doctrine to meet this or that practical 
emergency instead of keeping it adjusted to the whole 
scheme of life, is that you end by having half-a-dozen 
contradictory doctrines to suit half-a-dozen different 
emergencies. The Church solemnized and sanctified 
marriage without ever giving up its original Pauline doc- 
trine on the subject. And it soon fell into another con- 
fusion. At the point at which it took up marriage and 
endeavored to make it holy, marriage was, as it still is, 
largely a survival of the custom of selling women to men. 



Preface 195 

Now in all trades a marked difference is made in price 
between a new article and a second-hand one. The 
moment we meet with this difference in value betwen hu- 
man beings, we may know that we are in the slave- 
market, where the conception of our relations to the per- 
sons sold is neither religious nor natural nor human nor 
superhuman, but simply commercial. The Church, when 
it finally gave its blessing to marriage, did not, in its 
innocence, fathom these commercial traditions. Conse- 
quently it tried to sanctify them too, with grotesque re- 
sults. The slave-dealer having always asked more 
money for virginity, the Church, instead of detecting the 
money-changer and driving him out of the temple, took 
him for a sentimental and chivalrous lover, and, helped 
by its only half-discarded doctrine of celibacy, gave vir- 
ginity a heavenly value to ennoble its commercial pre- 
tensions. In short. Mammon, always mighty, put the 
Church in his pocket, where he keeps it to this day, in 
spite of the occasional saints and martyrs who contrive 
from time to time to get their heads and souls free to 
testify against him. 

Divorce a Sacramental Duty 

But Mammon overreached himself when he tried to 
impose his doctrine of inalienable property on the 
Church under the guise of indissoluble marriage. For 
the Church tried to shelter this inhuman doctrine and 
flat contradiction of the gospel by claiming, and rightly 
claiming, that marriage is a sacrament. So it is; but 
that is exactly what makes divorce a duty when the mar- 
riage has lost the inward and spiritual grace of which 
the marriage ceremony is the outward and visible sign. 
In vain do bishops stoop to pick up the discarded argu- 
ments of the atheists of fifty years ago by pleading that 
the words of Jesus were in an obscure Aramaic dialect. 



196 Getting Married 

and were probably misunderstood, as Jesus, they think, 
could not have said anything a bishop would disapprove 
of. Unless they are prepared to add that the statement 
that those who take the sacrament with their lips but not 
with their hearts eat and drink their own damnation is 
also a mistranslation from the Aramaic, they are most 
solemnly bound to shield marriage from profanation, not 
merely by permitting divorce, but by making it compul- 
sory in certain cases as the Chinese do. 

When the great protest of the XVI century came, and 
the Church was reformed in several countries, the 
Reformation was so largely a rebellion against sacer- 
dotalism that marriage was very nearly excommunicated 
again: our modern civil marriage, round which so many 
fierce controversies and political conflicts have raged, 
would have been thoroughly approved of by Calvin, and 
hailed with relief by Luther. But the instinctive doc- 
trine that there is something holy and mystic in sex, a 
doctrine which many of us now easily dissociate from 
any priestly ceremony, but which in those days seemed 
to all who felt it to need a ritual affirmation, could not 
be thrown on the scrap-heap with the sale of Indulgences 
and the like ; and so the Reformation left marriage where 
it was: a curious mixture of commercial sex slavery, 
early Christian sex abhorrence, and later Christian sex 
sanctification. 

Othello and Desdemona 

How strong was the feeling that a husband or a wife 
is an article of property, greatly depreciated in value at 
second-hand, and not to be used or touched by any per- 
son but the proprietor, may be learnt from Shakespear. 
His most infatuated and passionate lovers are Antony 
and Othello ; yet both of them betray the commercial and 
proprietary instinct the moment they lose their tempers. 



Preface 197 

" I found you," says Antony, reproaching Cleopatra, 
" as a morsel cold upon dead Caesar's trencher." Othel- 
lo's worst agony is the thought of " keeping a corner in 
the thing he loves for others' uses." But this is not what 
a man feels about the thing he loves, but about the thing 
he owns. I never understood the full significance of 
Othello's outburst until I one day heard a lady, in the 
course of a private discussion as to the feasibility of 
" group marriage," say with cold disgust that she would 
as soon think of lending her toothbrush to another 
woman as her husband. The sense of outraged manhood 
with which I felt myself and all other husbands thus re- 
duced to the rank of a toilet appliance gave me a very 
unpleasant taste of what Desdemona might have felt had 
she overheard Othello's outburst. I was so dumfounded 
that I had not the presence of mind to ask the lady 
whether she insisted on having a doctor, a nurse, a den- 
tist, and even a priest and solicitor all to herself as well. 
But I had too often heard men speak of women as if 
they were mere personal conveniences to feel surprised 
that exactly the same view is held, only more fastidiously, 
by women. 

All these views must be got rid of before we can have 
any healthy public opinion (on which depends our hav- 
ing a healthy population) on the subject of sex, and con- 
sequently of marriage. Whilst the subject is considered 
shameful and sinful we shall have no systematic instruc- 
tion in sexual hygiene, because such lectures as are given 
in Germany, France, and even prudish America (where 
the great Miltonic tradition in this matter still lives) 
will be considered a corruption of that youthful inno- 
cence which now subsists on nasty stories and whispered 
traditions handed down from generation to generation of 
school-children: stories and traditions which conceal 
nothing of sex but its dignity, its honor, its sacredness, 
its rank as the first necessity of society and the deepest 



198 Getting Married 

concern of the nation. We shall continue to maintain 
the White Slave Trade and protect its exploiters by, on 
the one hand, tolerating the white slave as the necessary 
breakwater of marriage; and, on the other, trampling on 
her and degrading her until she has nothing to hope 
from our Courts ; and so, with policemen at every corner, 
and law triumphant all over Europe, she will still be 
smuggled and cattle-driven from one end of the civilized 
world to the other, cheated, beaten, bullied, and hunted 
into the streets to disgusting overwork, without daring to 
utter the cry for help that brings, not rescue, but expo- 
sure and infamy, yet revenging herself terribly in the 
end by scattering blindness and sterility, pain and dis- 
figurement, insanity and death among us with the cer- 
tainty that we are much too pious and genteel to allow 
such things to be mentioned with a view to saving either 
her or ourselves from them. And all the time we shall 
keep enthusiastically investing her trade with every al- 
lurement that the art of the novelist, the playwright, the 
dancer, the milliner, the painter, the limelight man, and 
the sentimental poet can devize, after which we shall con- 
tinue to be very much shocked and surprised when the 
cry of the youth, of the young wife, of the mother, of 
the infected nurse, and of all the other victims, direct 
and indirect, arises with its invariable refrain: "Why 
did nobody warn me ? " 

What is to become of the Children? 

I must not reply flippantly. Make them all Wards in 
Chancery; yet that would be enough to put any sensible 
person on the track of the reply. One would think, to 
hear the way in which people sometimes ask the question, 
that not only does marriage prevent the difficulty from 
ever arising, but that nothing except divorce can ever 
raise it. It is true that if you divorce the parents, the 



Preface 199 

children have to be disposed of. But if you hang the 
parents, or imprison the parents, or take the children out 
of the custody of the parents because they hold Shelley's 
opinions, or if the parents die, the same difficulty arises. 
And as these things have happened again and again, and 
as we have had plenty of experience of divorce decrees 
and separation orders, the attempt to use children as an 
obstacle to divorce is hardly worth arguing with. We 
shall deal with the children just as we should deal with 
them if their homes were broken up by any other cause. 
There is a sense in which children are a real obstacle to 
divorce: they give parents a common interest which 
keeps together many a couple who, if childless, would 
separate. The marriage law is superfluous in such cases. 
This is shewn by the fact that the proportion of childless 
divorces is much larger than the proportion of divorces 
from all causes. But it must not be forgotten that the 
interest of the children forms one of the most powerful 
arguments for divorce. An unhappy household is a bad 
nursery. There is something to be said for the polygy- 
nous or polyandrous household as a school for children: 
children really do suffer from having too few parents: 
this is why uncles and aunts and tutors and governesses 
are often so good for children. But it is just the po- 
lygamous household which our marriage law allows to 
be broken up, and which, as we have seen, is not possi- 
ble as a typical institution in a democratic country where 
the numbers of the sexes are about equal. Therefore 
polygyny and polyandry as a means of educating children 
fall to the ground, and with them, I think, must go the 
opinion which has been expressed by Gladstone and oth- 
ers, that an extension of divorce, whilst admitting many 
new groimds for it, might exclude the ground of adultery. 
There are, however, clearly many things that make some 
of our domestic interiors little private hells for children 
(especially when the children are quite content in them) 



200 Getting Married 



to 



which would justify any intelligent State in breaking up 
the home and giving the custody of the children either 
to the parent whose conscience had revolted against the 
corruption of the children, or to neither. 

Which brings me to the point that divorce should no 
longer be confined to cases in which one of the parties 
petitions for it. If, for instance, you have a thoroughly 
rascally couple making a living by infamous means and 
bringing up their children to their trade, the king's 
proctor, instead of pursuing his present purely mischiev- 
ous function of preventing couples from being divorced 
by proving that they both desire it, might very well in- 
tervene and divorce these children from their parents. 
At present, if the Queen herself were to rescue some un- 
fortunate child from degradation and misery and place 
her in a respectable home, and some unmentionable pair 
of blackguards claimed the child and proved that they 
were its father and mother, the child would be given to 
them in the name of the sanctity of the home and the 
holiness of parentage, after perpetrating which crime, 
the law would calmly send an education officer to take 
the child out of the parents' hands several hours a day 
in the still more sacred name of compulsory education. 
(Of course what would really happen would be that the 
couple would blackmail the Queen for their consent to 
the salvation of the child, unless, indeed, a hint from a 
police inspector convinced them that bad characters can- 
not always rely on pedantically constitutional treat- 
ment when they come into conflict with persons in high 
station). 

The truth is, not only must the bond between man and 
wife be made subject to a reasonable consideration of 
the welfare of the parties concerned and of the commun- 
ity, but the whole family bond as well. The theory that 
the wife is the property of the husband or the husband 
of the wife is not a whit less abhorrent and mischievous 



Preface 201 

than the theory that the child is the property of the par 
ent. Parental bondage will go the way of conjugal 
bondage: indeed the order of reform should rather be 
put the other way about ; for the helplessness of children 
has already compelled the State to intervene between 
parent and child more than between husband and wife. 
If you pay less than £40 a year rent, you will sometimes 
feel tempted to say to the vaccination officer, the school 
attendance officer, and the sanitary inspector : " Is this 
child mine or yours ? " The answer is that as the child 
is a vital part of the nation, the nation cannot afford to 
leave it at the irresponsible disposal of any individual or 
couple of individuals as a mere small parcel of private 
property. The only solid ground that the parent can 
take is that as the State, in spite of its imposing name, 
can, when all is said, do nothing with the child except 
place it in the charge of some human being or another, 
the parent is no worse a custodian than a stranger. And 
though this proposition may seem highly questionable at 
first sight to those who imagine that only parents spoil 
children, yet those who realize that children are as often 
spoilt by severity and coldness as by indulgence, and 
that the notion that natural parents are any worse than 
adopted parents is probably as complete an illusion as 
the notion that they are any better, see no serious likeli- 
hood that State action will detach children from their 
parents more than it does at present: nay, it is even 
likely that the present system of taking the children out 
of the parents' hands and having the parental duty per- 
formed by officials, will, as poverty and ignorance be- 
come the exception instead of the rule, give way to the 
system of simply requiring certain results, beginning 
with the baby's weight and ending perhaps with some 
sort of practical arts degree, but leaving parents and 
children to achieve the results as they best may. Such 
freedom is, of course, impossible in our present poverty- 



202 Getting Married 

stricken circumstances. As long as the masses of our 
people are too poor to be good parents or good anything 
else except beasts of burden, it is no use requiring much 
more from them but hewing of wood and drawing of 
water: whatever is to be done must be done for them, 
mostly, alas ! by people whose superiority is merely tech- 
nical. Until we abolish poverty it is impossible to push 
rational measures of any kind very far: the wolf at the 
door will compel us to live in a state of siege and to do 
everything by a bureaucratic martial law that would be 
quite unnecessary and indeed intolerable in a prosperous 
community. But„ however we settle the question, we 
must make the parent justify his custody of the child 
exactly as we should make a stranger justify it. If a 
family is not achieving the purposes of a family it should 
be dissolved just as a marriage should when it, too, is 
not achieving the purposes of marriage. The notion 
that there is or ever can be anything magical and inviol- 
able in the legal relations of domesticity, and the curious 
confusion of ideas which makes some of our bishops im- 
agine that in the phrase " Whom God hath joined," the 
word God means the district registrar or the Reverend 
John Smith or William Jones, must be got rid of. Means 
of breaking up undesirable families are as necessary to 
the preservation of the family as means of dissolving un- 
desirable marriages are to the preservation of marriage. 
If our domestic laws are kept so inhuman that they at 
last provoke a furious general insurrection against them 
as they already provoke many private ones, we shall in 
a very literal sense empty the baby out with the bath by 
abolishing an institution which needs nothing more than 
a little obvious and easy rationalizing to make it not only 
harmless but comfortable, honorable, and useful. 



Preface 203 

The Cost of Divorce 

But please do not imagine that the evils of indissolu- 
ble marriage can be cured by divorce laws administered 
on our present plan. The very cheapest undefended di- 
vorce, even when conducted by a solicitor for its own 
sake and that of humanity, costs at least <£30 out-of- 
pocket expenses. To a client on business terms it costs 
about three times as much. Until divorce is as cheap as 
marriage, marriage will remain indissoluble for all ex- 
cept the handful of people to whom <£100 is a procurable 
sum. For the enormous majority of us there is no differ- 
ence in this respect between a hundred and a quadrillion. 
Divorce is the one thing you may not sue for in forma 
pauperis. 

Let me, then, recommend as follows: 

1. Make divorce as easy, as cheap, and as private 
as marriage. 

2. Grant divorce at the request of either party, 
whether the other consents or not; and admit no other 
ground than the request, which should be made without 
stating any reasons. 

3. Confine the power of dissolving marriage for mis- 
conduct to the State acting on the petition of the king's 
proctor or other suitable functionary, who may, however, 
be moved by either party to intervene in ordinary request 
cases, not to prevent the divorce taking place, but to en- 
force alimony if it be refused and the case is one which 
needs it. 

4. Make it impossible for marriage to be used as a 
punishment as it is at present. Send the husband and 
wife to penal servitude if you disapprove of their con- 
duct and want to punish them ; but do not send them back 
to perpetual wedlock. 

5. If, on the other hand, you think a couple perfectly 
innocent and well conducted, do not condemn them also 



204 Getting Married 

to perpetual wedlock against their wills, thereby making 
the treatment of what you consider innocence on both 
sides the same as the treatment of what you consider 
guilt on both sides. 

6. Place the work of a wife and mother on the same 
footing as other work: that is, on the footing of labor 
worthy of its hire; and provide for unemployment in it 
exactly as for unemployment in shipbuilding or any 
other recognized bread-winning trade. 

7. And take and deal with all the consequences of 
these acts of justice instead of letting yourself be fright- 
ened out of reason and good sense by fear of conse- 
quences. We must finally adapt our institutions to hu- 
man nature. In the long run our present plan of trying 
to force human nature into a mould of existing abuses, 
superstitions, and corrupt interests, produces the explo- 
sive forces that wreck civilization. 

8. Never forget that if you leave your law to judges 
and your religion to bishops, you will presently find 
yourself without either law or religion. If you doubt 
this, ask any decent judge or bishop. Do not ask some- 
body who does not know what a judge is, or what a 
bishop is, or what the law is, or what religion is. In 
other words, do not ask your newspaper. Journalists are 
too poorly paid in this country to know anything that is 
fit for publication. 

Conclusions 

To sum up, we have to depend on the solution of the 
problem of unemployment, probably on the principles 
laid down in the Minority Report of the Royal Commis- 
sion on the Poor Law, to make the sexual relations be- 
tween men and women decent and honorable by making 
women economically independent of men, and (in the 
younger son section of the upper classes) men economi- 



Preface 205 

cally independent of women. We also have to bring our- 
selves into line with the rest of Protestant civilization by- 
providing means for dissolving all unhappy, improper, 
and inconvenient marriages. And, as it is our cautious 
custom to lag behind the rest of the world to see how 
their experiments in reform turn out before venturing 
ourselves, and then take advantage of their experience 
to get ahead of them, we should recognize that the an- 
cient system of specifying grounds for divorce, such as 
adultery, cruelty, drunkenness, felony, insanity, va- 
grancy, neglect to provide for wife and children, deser- 
tion, public defamation, violent temper, religious hetero- 
doxy, contagious disease, outrages, indignities, personal 
abuse, " mental anguish," conduct rendering life burden- 
some and so forth (all these are examples from some 
code actually in force at present), is a mistake, because 
the only effect of compelling people to plead and prove 
misconduct is that cases are manufactured and clean linen 
purposely smirched and washed in public, to the great 
distress and disgrace of innocent children and relatives, 
whilst the grounds have at the same time to be made so 
general that any sort of human conduct may be brought 
within them by a little special pleading and a little men- 
tal reservation on the part of witnesses examined on oath. 
When it comes to " conduct rendering life burdensome," 
it is clear that no marriage is any longer indissoluble; 
and the sensible thing to do then is to grant divorce 
whenever it is desired, without asking why. 



GETTING MARRIED 

On a fine morning in the spring of 1908 the Norman 
kitchen in the Palace of the Bishop of Chelsea looks 
very spacious and clean and handsome and healthy. 

The Bishop is lucky enough to have a XII century 
palace. The palace itself has been lucky enough to es- 
cape being carved up into XV century Gothic, or shaved 
into XVIII century ashlar, or " restored " by a XIX 
century builder and a Victorian architect rvith a deep 
sense of the umbrella-like gentlemanliness of XIV cen- 
tury vaulting. The present occupant, A. Chelsea, un- 
officially Alfred Bridgenorth, appreciates Norman work. 
He has, by adroit complaints of the discomfort of the 
place, induced the Ecclesiastical Commissioners to give 
him some money to spend on it; and rvith this he has got 
rid of the wall papers, the paint, the partitions, the ex- 
quisitely planed and moulded casings with which the 
Victorian cabinetmakers enclosed and hid the huge black 
beams of hewn oak, and of all other expedients of his 
predecessors to make themselves feel at home and re- 
spectable in a Norman fortress. It is a house built to 
last for ever. The walls and beams are big enough to 
carry the tower of Babel, as if the builders, anticipating 
our modern ideas and instinctively defying them, had re- 
solved to shew how much material they could lavish on 
a house built for the glory of God, instead of keeping a 

20T 



208 Getting Married 

competitive eye on the advantage of sending in the lowest 
tender, and scientifically calcidating how little material 
would be enough to prevent the whole affair from tum- 
bling down by its own weight. 

The kitchen is the Bishop's favorite room. This is not 
at all because he is a man of humble mind; but because 
the kitchen is one of the finest rooms in the house. The 
Bishop has neither the income nor the appetite to have 
his cooking done there. The windows, high up in the 
wall, look north and south. The north window is the 
largest; and if we look into the kitchen through it we see 
facing us the south wall with small Norman windows 
and an open door near the corner to the left. Through 
this door we have a glimpse of the garden, and of a gar- 
den chair in the sunshine. In the right-hand corner is an 
entrance to a vaulted circular chamber with a winding 
stair leading up through a tower to the upper floors of 
the palace. In the wall to our right is the immense fire- 
place, with its huge spit like a baby crane, and a collec- 
tion of old iron and brass instruments which pass as the 
original furniture of the fire, though as a matter of fact 
they have been picked up from time to time by the 
Bishop at secondhand shops. In the near end of the left- 
hand wall a small Norman door gives access to the Bish- 
op's study, formerly a scullery. Further along, a great 
oak chest stands against the wall. Across the middle of 
the kitchen is a big timber table surrounded by eleven 
stout rush-bottomed chairs: four on the far side, three 
on the near side, and two at each end. There is a big 
chair with railed back and sides on the hearth. On the 
floor is a drugget of thick fibre matting. The only other 
piece of furniture is a clock with a wooden dial about as 
large as the bottom of a washtub, the weights, chains, 
and pendulum being of corresponding magnitude; but 
the Bishop has long since abandoned the attempt to keep 
it going. It hangs above the oak chest. 



Getting Married 209 

The kitchen is occupied at present by the Bishop's 
lady, Mrs Bridgenorth, who is talking to Mr William 
Collins, the green-grocer. He is in evening dress, though 
it is early forenoon. Mrs Bridgenorth is a quiet happy- 
looking woman of fifty or thereabouts, placid, gentle, and 
humorous, with delicate features and fine grey hair with 
many white threads. She is dressed as for some festiv- 
ity; but she is taking things easily as she sits in the big 
chair by the hearth, reading The Times. 

Collins is an elderly man with a rather youthful waist. 
His muttonchop whiskers have a coquettish touch of 
Dundreary at their lower ends. He is an affable man, 
with those perfect manners which can be acquired only 
in keeping a shop for the sale of necessaries of life to 
ladies whose social position is so unquestionable that they 
are not anxious about it. He is a reassuring man, with 
a vigilant grey eye, and the power of saying anything he 
likes to you without offence, because his tone always im- 
plies that he does it with your kind permission. Withal 
by no means servile: rather gallant and compassionate, 
but never without a conscientious recognition, on public 
grounds, of social distinctions. He is at the oak chest 
counting a pile of napkins. 

Mrs Bridgenorth reads placidly: Collins counts: a 
blackbird sings in the garden. Mrs Bridgenorth puts 
The Times down in her lap and considers Collins for a 
moment. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Do you never feel nervous on 
these occasions, Collins? 

Collins. Lord bless you, no, maam. It would be 
a joke, after marrying five of your daughters, if I was 
to get nervous over marrying the last of them. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. I have always said you were a 
wonderful man, Collins. 

Collins \^almost blushing'\ Oh, maam! 



210 Getting Married 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Yes. I never could arrange 
anything — a wedding or even a dinner^without some 
hitch or other. 

CoLUNs. Why should you give yourself the trouble, 
maam? Send for the greengrocer, maam: thats the secret 
of easy housekeeping. Bless you, it's his business. It 
pays him and you, let alone the pleasure in a house like 
this [Mrs Bridgenorth bows in acknorvledgment of the 
compliment]. They joke about the greengrocer, just as 
they joke about the mother-in-law. But they cant get 
on without both. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. What a bond between us, Collins ! 

Collins. Bless you, maam, theres all sorts of bonds 
between all sorts of people. You are a very affable lady, 
maam, for a Bishop's lady. I have known Bishop's la- 
dies that would fairly provoke you to up and cheek them ; 
but nobody would ever forget himself and his place with 
you, maam. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Collins: you are a flatterer. 
You will superintend the breakfast yourself as usual, of 
course, wont you? 

Collins. Yes, yes, bless you, maam, of course. I 
always do. Them fashionable caterers send down such 
people as I never did set eyes on. Dukes you would take 
them for. You see the relatives shaking hands with 
them and asking them about the family — actually ladies 
saying " Where have we met before.^ " and all sorts of 
confusion. Thats my secret in business, maam. You 
can always spot me as the greengrocer. It's a fortune 
to me in these days, when you cant hardly tell who any- 
one is or isnt. [He goes out through the torver, and im- 
mediately returns for a moment to announce] The Gen- 
eral, maam. 

Mrs Bridgenorth rises to receive her brother-in-law, 
who enters resplendent in full-dress uniform, with many 
medals and orders. General Bridgenorth is a well set up 



Getting Married 211 

man of fifty, with large brave nostrils, an iron mouth, 
faithful dog's eyes, and much natural simplicity and dig- 
nity of character. He is ignorant, stupid, and preju- 
diced, having been carefully trained to be so; and it is 
not always possible to be patient rvith him when his 
unquestionably good intentions become actively mischiev- 
ous; but one blames society, not himself, for this. He 
woidd be no worse a man than Collins, had he enjoyed 
Collins's social opportunities. He comes to the hearth, 
where Mrs Bridgenorth is standing rvith her back to the 
fireplace. 

Mrs Bridgenorth, Good morning. Boxer. [They 
shake hands]. Another niece to give away. This is the 
last of them. 

The General [very glooiny] Yes, Alice. Nothing 
for the old warrior uncle to do but give away brides to 
luckier men than himself. Has — [he chokes] has your 
sister come yet? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Why do you always call Lesbia 
my sister ? Dont you know that it annoys her more than 
any of the rest of your tricks ? 

The General. Tricks! Ha! Well, I'll try to break 
myself of it; but I think she might bear with me in a 
little thing like that. She knows that her name sticks 
in my throat. Better call her your sister than try to call 
her L — [he almost breaks down] L — well, call her by 
her name and make a fool of myself by crying. [He 
sits down at the near end of the table]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [going to him and rallying him] 
Oh come, Boxer ! Really, really ! We are no longer 
boys and girls. You cant keep up a broken heart all 
your life. It must be nearly twenty years since she 
refused you. And you know that it's not because 
she dislikes you, but only that she's not a marrying 
woman. 

The General. It's no use. I love her still. And 



212 Getting Married 

I cant help telling her so whenever we meet, though I 
know it makes her avoid me. [He all but weeps]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. What does she say when you 
tell her? 

The General. Only that she wonders when I am 
going to grow out of it. I know now that I shall never 
grow out of it. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Perhaps you would if you mar- 
ried her. I believe youre better as you are. Boxer. 

The General. I'm a miserable man. I'm really 
sorry to be a ridiculous old bore, Alice ; but when I come 
to this house for a wedding — to these scenes — to — to — 
recollections of the past — always to give the bride to 
somebody else, and never to have my bride given to me 
— [he rises abruptly] May I go into the garden and 
smoke it off? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Do, Boxer. 

Collins returns with the wedding cake. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Oh, heres the cake. I believe 
it's the same one we had for Florence's wedding. 

The General. I cant bear it [he hurries out through 
the garden door]. 

Collins [putting the cake on the table] Well, look 
at that, maam ! Aint it odd that after all the weddings 
he's given away at, the General cant stand the sight of a 
wedding cake yet. It always seems to give him the same 
shock. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Well, it's his last shock. You 
have married the whole family now, Collins. [She takes 
up The Times again and resumes her seat]. 

Collins. Except your sister, maam. A fine charac- 
ter of a lady, maam, is Miss Grantham. I have an ambi- 
tion to arrange her wedding breakfast. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. She wont marry, Collins. 

Collins. Bless you, maam, they all say that. You 
and me said it, I'll lay. I did, anyhow. 



Getting Married 213 

Mrs Bridgenorth. No: marriage came natural to 
me. I should have thought it did to you too. 

Collins [pensivel No, maam: it didnt come natural. 
My wife had to break me into it. It came natural to 
her : she's what you might call a regular old hen. Always 
wants to have her family within sight of her. Wouldnt 
go to bed unless she knew they was all safe at home and 
the door locked, and the lights out. Always wants her 
luggage in the carriage with her. Always goes and 
makes the engine driver promise her to be careful. She's 
a born wife and mother, maam. Thats why my children 
all ran away from home. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Did you ever feel inclined to run 
away, Collins? 

Collins. Oh yes, maam, yes : very often. But when 
it came to the point I couldnt bear to hurt her feelings. 
Shes a sensitive, affectionate, anxious soul; and she was 
never brought up to know what freedom is to some peo- 
ple. You see, family life is all the life she knows : she's 
like a bird born in a cage, that would die if you let it 
loose in the woods. When I thought how little it was 
to a man of my easy temper to put up with her, and how 
deep it would hurt her to think it was because I didnt 
care for her, I always put off running away till next 
time ; and so in the end I never ran away at all. I dare- 
say it was good for me to be took such care of; but it 
cut me off from all my old friends something dreadful, 
maam: especially the women, maam. She never gave 
them a chance: she didnt indeed. She never understood 
that married people should take holidays from one an- 
other if they are to keep at all fresh. Not that I ever 
got tired of her, maam ; but my ! how I used to get tired 
of home life sometimes. I used to catch myself envying 
my brother George: I positively did, maam. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. George was a bachelor then, I 
suppose ."* 



214 Getting Married 

Collins. Bless you, no, maam. He married a very 
fine figure of a woman ; but she was that changeable and 
what you might call susceptible, you would not believe. 
She didnt seem to have any control over herself when she 
fell in love. She would mope for a couple of days, cry- 
ing about nothing; and then she would up and say — no 
matter who was there to hear her — " I must go to him, 
George " ; and away she would go from her home and 
her husband without with-your-leave or by-your-leave. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. But do you mean that she did 
this more than once? That she came back? 

Collins. Bless you, maam, she done it five times to 
my own knowledge ; and then George gave up telling us 
about it, he got so used to it. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. But did he always take her back? 

Collins. Well, what could he do, maam? Three 
times out of four the men would bring her back the same 
evening and no harm done. Other times theyd run away 
from her. What could any man with a heart do but com- 
fort her when she came back crying at the way they 
dodged her when she threw herself at their heads, pre- 
tending they was too noble to accept the sacrifice she 
was making. George told her again and again that if 
she'd only stay at home and hold off a bit theyd 
be at her feet all day long. She got sensible at last 
and took his advice. George always liked change of 
company. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. What an odious woman, Col- 
lins ! Dont you think so ? 

Collins [judicially] Well, many ladies with a do- 
mestic turn thought so and said so, maam. But I will 
say for Mrs George that the variety of experience made 
her wonderful interesting. Thats where the flighty ones 
score off the steady ones, maam. Look at my old 
woman ! She's never known any man but me ; and she 
cant properly know me, because she dont know other 



Getting Married 215 

men to compare me with. Of course she knows her par- 
ents in — well, in the way one does know one's parents: 
not knowing half their lives as you might say, or ever 
thinking that they was ever young; and she knew her 
children as children, and never thought of them as inde- 
pendent human beings till they ran away and nigh broke 
her heart for a week or two. But Mrs George she came 
to know a lot about men of all sorts and ages; for the 
older she got the younger she liked em; and it certainly 
made her interesting, and gave her a lot of sense. I have 
often taken her advice on things when my own poor old 
woman wouldnt have been a bit of use to me. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. I hope you dont tell your wife 
that you go elsewhere for advice. 

Collins. Lord bless you, maam, I'm that fond of my 
old Matilda that I never tell her anything at all for fear 
of hurting her feelings. You see, she's such an out-and- 
out wife and mother that she's hardly a responsible hu- 
man being out of her house, except when she's marketing. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Does she approve of Mrs 
George } 

Collins. Oh, Mrs George gets round her. Mrs 
George can get round anybody if she wants to. And 
then Mrs George is very particular about religion. And 
shes a clairvoyant. 

Mrs Bridgenorth \^surprised] A clairvoyant ! 

Collins [calm] Oh yes, maam, yes. All you have 
to do is to mesmerize her a bit; and off she goes into a 
trance, and says the most wonderful things ! not things 
about herself, but as if it was the whole human race giv- 
ing you a bit of its mind. Oh, wonderful, maam, I 
assure you. You couldnt think of a game that Mrs 
George isnt up to. 

Lesbia Grantham comes in through the torver. She is 
a tall, handsome, slender lady in her prime: that is, be- 
trveen 36 and 55. She has what is called a well-bred air. 



216 Getting Married 

dressing very carefully to produce that effect without 
the least regard for the latest fashions, sure of herself, 
very terrifying to the young and shy, fastidious to the 
ends of her long finger-tips, and tolerant and amused 
rather than sympathetic. 

Lesbia. Good morning, dear big sister. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Good morning, dear little sister. 
[They hiss^. 

Lesbia, Good morning, Collins. How well you are 
looking! And how young! \She turns the middle chair 
away from the table and sits down^. 

Collins. Thats only my professional habit at a wed- 
ding, Miss. You should see me at a political dinner. 
I look nigh seventy, \^Loohing at his watch] Time's 
getting along, maam. May I send up word from you 
to Miss Edith to hurry a bit with her dressing? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Do, Collins. 

Collins goes out through the tower, taking the cake 
with him. 

Lesbia. Dear old Collins ! Has he told you any 
stories this morning.^ 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Yes. You were just late for a 
particularly thrilling invention of his. 

Lesbia. About Mrs George? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Yes. He says she's a clair- 
voyant. 

Lesbia. I wonder whether he really invented Mrs 
George, or stole her out of some book. 

Mrs Bridgenorth, I wonder! 

Lesbia, Wheres the Barmecide? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. In the study, working away at 
his new book. He thinks no more now of having a 
daughter married than of having an egg for breakfast. 

The General, soothed by smoking, comes in from the 
garden. 

The General [with resolute bonhomie] Ah, Lesbia! 



Getting Married 217 

How do you do? [They shake hands j and he takes the 
chair on her right], 

Mrs Bridgenorth goes out through the torver. 

Lesbia. How are you. Boxer? You look almost as 
gorgeous as the wedding cake. 

The General. I make a point of appearing in uni- 
form whenever I take part in any ceremony, as a lesson 
to the subalterns. It is not the custom in England; but 
it ought to be. 

Lesbia. You look very fine. Boxer. What a frightful 
lot of bravery all these medals must represent ! 

The General. No, Lesbia. They represent despair 
and cowardice. I won all the early ones by trying to get 
killed. You know why. 

Lesbia. But you had a charmed life? 

The General. Yes, a charmed life. Bayonets bent 
on my buckles. Bullets passed through me and left no 
trace: thats the worst of modern bullets: Ive never been 
hit by a dum-dum. When I was only a company officer 
I had at least the right to expose myself to death in the 
field. Now I'm a General even that resource is cut off. 
{Persuasively drawing his chair nearer to her] Listen 
to me, Lesbia. For the tenth and last time — 

Lesbia [interrupting] On Florence's wedding morn- 
ing, two years ago, you said " For the ninth and last 
time." 

The General. We are two years older, Lesbia. I'm 
fifty: you are — 

Lesbia. Yes, I know. It's no use. Boxer. When 
will you be old enough to take no for an answer? 

The General. Never, Lesbia, never. You have 
never given me a real reason for refusing me yet. I once 
thought it was somebody else. There were lots of fel- 
lows after you; but now theyve all given it up and mar- 
ried. [Bending still nearer to her] Lesbia: tell me 
your secret. Why — 



218 Getting Married 

hESBiA [sniffing disgustedly] Oh! Youve been smok- 
ing. l^She rises and goes to the chair on the hearth] 
Keep away, you wretch. 

The General. But for that pipe, I could not have 
faced you without breaking down. It has soothed me 
and nerved me. 

Lesbia [sitting down with The Times in her hand] 
Well, it has nerved me to tell you why I'm going to be 
an old maid. 

The General [impulsively approaching her] Dont 
say that, Lesbia. It's not natural: it's not right: 
it's — 

Lesbia [fanning him off] No : no closer. Boxer, 
please. [He retreats, discouraged^. It may not be nat- 
ural; but it happens all the time. Youll find plenty of 
women like me, if you care to look for them: women with 
lots of character and good looks and money and offers, 
who wont and dont get married. Cant you guess why? 

The General. I can understand when there is 
another. 

Lesbia. Yes ; but there isnt another. Besides, do you 
suppose I think, at my time of life, that the difference 
between one decent sort of man and another is worth 
bothering about .'' 

The General. The heart has its preferences, Lesbia, 
One image, and one only, gets indelibly — 

Lesbia. Yes. Excuse my interrupting you so often; 
but your sentiments are so correct that I always know 
what you are going to say before you finish. You see. 
Boxer, everybody is not like you. You are a sentimental 
noodle: you dont see women as they really are. You 
dont see me as I really am. Now I do see men as they 
really are. I see you as you really are. 

The General [murmuring] No: dont say that, 
Lesbia, 

Lesbia. I'm a regular old maid, I'm very particular 



Getting Married 219 

about my belongings. I like to have my own house, and 
to have it to myself. I have a very keen sense of beauty 
and fitness and cleanliness and order. I am proud of my 
independence and jealous for it. I have a sufficiently 
well-stocked mind to be very good company for myself 
if I have plenty of books and music. The one thing I 
never could stand is a great lout of a man smoking all 
over my house and going to sleep in his chair after din- 
ner, and untidy ing everything. Ugh ! 

The General. But love — 

Lesbia. Oh, love ! Have you no imagination ? Do 
you think I have never been in love witli wonderful men .^ 
heroes ! archangels ! princes ! sages ! even fascinating ras- 
cals ! and had the strangest adventures with them ? Do 
you know what it is to look at a mere real man after 
that? a man with his boots in every corner, and the smell 
of his tobacco in every curtain ? 

The General [^somewhat dased] Well but — excuse 
my mentioning it — dont you want children.^ 

Lesbia. I ought to have children. I should be a 
good mother to children. I believe it would pay the 
country very well to pay me very well to have children. 
But the country tells me that I cant have a child in my 
house without a man in it too; so I tell the country that 
it will have to do without my children. If I am to be a 
mother, I really cannot have a man bothering me to be 
a wife at the same time. 

The General. My dear Lesbia: you know I dont 
wish to be impertinent; but these are not the correct 
views for an English lady to express. 

Lesbia. That is why I dont express them, except to 
gentlemen who wont take any otlier answer. The diffi- 
culty, you see, is that I really am an English lady, and 
am particularly proud of being one. 

The General. I'm sure of that, Lesbia: quite sure 
of it. I never meant — 



220 Getting Married 

Lesbia [rising impatiently] Oh, my dear Boxer, do 
please try to think of something else than whether you 
have offended me, and whether you are doing the correct 
thing as an English gentleman. You are faultless, and 
very dull. [She shakes her shoulders intolerantly and 
walks across to the other side of the kitchen]. 

The General [moodily] Ha! thats whats the matter 
with me. Not clever, A poor silly soldier man. 

Lesbia. The whole matter is very simple. As I say, 
I am an English lady, by which I mean that I have been 
trained to do without what I cant have on honorable 
terms, no matter what it is. 

The General. I really dont understand you, Lesbia. 

Lesbia \turning on him] Then why on earth do you 
want to marry a woman you dont understand.'' 

The General. I dont know. I suppose I love you. 

Lesbia. Well, Boxer, you can love me as much as 
you like, provided you look happy about it and dont bore 
me. But you cant marry me ; and thats all about it. 

The General. It's so frightfully difficult to argue 
the matter fairly with you without wounding your del- 
icacy by overstepping the bounds of good taste. But 
surely there are calls of nature — 

Lesbia. Dont be ridiculous. Boxer. 

The General. Well, how am I to express it? Hang 
it all, Lesbia, dont you want a husband? 

Lesbia. No. I want children ; and I want to devote 
myself entirely to my children, and not to their father. 
The law will not allow me to do that; so I have made up 
my mind to have neither husband nor children. 

The General. But, great Heavens, the natural ap- 
petites — 

Lesbia. As I said before, an English lady is not the 
slave of her appetites. That is what an English gentle- 
man seems incapable of understanding. [She sits dorvn 
at the end of the table, near the study door] . 



Getting Married 221 

The General {huffily^ Oh well, if you refuse, you 
refuse. I shall not ask you again. I'm sorry I returned 
to the subject. \^He retires to the hearth and plants 
himself there, wounded and lofty]. 

Lesbia. Dont be cross, Boxer. 

The General. I'm not cross, only wovmded, Lesbia. 
And when you talk like that, I dont feel convinced: I 
only feel utterly at a loss. 

Lesbia. Well, you know our family rule. When at a 
loss consult the greengrocer. Inopportunely Collins 
conies in through the tower] . Here he is. 

Collins. Sorry to be so much in and out, Miss. I 
thought Mrs Bridgenorth was here. The table is ready 
now for the breakfast, if she would like to see it. 

Lesbia. If you are satisfied, Collins, I am sure she 
will be. 

The General. By the way, Collins: I thought 
theyd made you an alderman. 

Collins. So they have, General. 

The General. Then wheres your gown? 

Collins. I dont wear it in private life. General. 

The General. Why? Are you ashamed of it? 

Collins. No, General. To tell you the truth, I take 
a pride in it. I cant help it. 

The General. Attention, Collins. Come here. 
[Collins comes to him]. Do you see my uniform — all 
my medals? 

Collins. Yes, General. They strike the eye, as it 
were. 

The General. They are meant to. Very well. 
Now you know, dont you, that your services to the com- 
munity as a greengrocer are as important and as digni- 
fied as mine as a soldier? 

Collins. I'm sure it's very honorable of you to say 
so. General. 

The General l^emphatically] You know also, dont 



222 Getting Married 

you, that any man who can see anything ridiculous, or 
unmanly, or unbecoming in your work or in your civic 
robes is not a gentleman, but a jumping, bounding, snort- 
ing cad? 

Collins. Well, strictly between ourselves, that is my 
opinion. General. 

The General. Then why not dignify my niece's 
wedding by wearing your robes.'' 

Collins. A bargain's a bargain. General. Mrs 
Bridgenorth sent for the greengrocer, not for the alder- 
man. It's just as unpleasant to get more than you bar- 
gain for as to get less. 

The General. I'm sure she will agree with me. I 
attach importance to this as an affirmation of solidarity 
in the service of the community. The Bishop's apron, 
my uniform, your robes: the Church, the Army, and the 
Municipality. 

Collins [retiring] Very well. General. \_He turns 
dubiously to Lesbia on his way to the tower]. I wonder 
what my wife will say, Miss ? 

The General. What ! Is your wife ashamed of 
your robes? 

Collins. No, sir, not ashamed of them. But she 
grudged the money for them; and she will be afraid of 
my sleeves getting into the gravy. 

Mrs Bridgenorth, her placidity quite upset, comes in 
rvith a letter; hurries past Collins; and comes between 
Lesbia and the General. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Lesbia: Boxer: heres a pretty 
mess ! 

Collins goes out discreetly. 

The General. Whats the matter? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Reginald's in London, and wants 
to come to the wedding. 

The General [stupended] Well, dash my buttons! 

Lesbia. Oh, all right, let him come. 



Getting Married 223 

The General. Let him come ! Why, the decree has 
not been made absolute yet. Is he to walk in here to 
Edith's wedding, reeking from the Divorce Court .^ 

Mrs Bridgenorth [vej:edly sitting down in the mid- 
dle chair] It's too bad. No: I cant forgive him, Les- 
bia, really. A man of Reginald's age, with a young wife 
— the best of girls, and as pretty as she can be — to go 
off with a common woman from the streets ! Ugh ! 

Lesbia. You must make allowances. What can you 
expect.^ Reginald was always weak. He was brought 
up to be weak. The family property was all mortgaged 
when he inherited it. He had to struggle along in con- 
stant money difficulties, hustled by his solicitors, morally 
bullied by the Barmecide, and physically bullied by 
Boxer, while they two were fighting their own way and 
getting well trained. You know very well he couldnt 
afford to marry until the mortgages were cleared and he 
was over fifty. And then of course he made a fool of 
himself marrying a child like Leo. 

The General. But to hit her! Absolutely to hit 
her ! He knocked her down — knocked her flat down on 
a flowerbed in the presence of his gardener. He ! the 
head of the family ! the man that stands before the 
Barmecide and myself as Bridgenorth of Bridgenorth ! 
to beat his wife and go off with a low woman and be 
divorced for it in the face of all England ! in the face of 
my uniform and Alfred's apron ! I can never forget 
what I felt: it was only the King's personal request — 
virtually a command — that stopped me from resigning 
my commission. I'd cut Reginald dead if I met him in 
the street. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Besides, Leo's coming. Theyd 
meet. It's impossible, Lesbia. 

Lesbia, Oh, I forgot that. That settles it. He 
mustnt come. 

The General. Of course he mustnt. You tell him 



224 Getting Married 

that if he enters this house, I'll leave it; and so will 
every decent man and woman in it. 

Collins [returning for a moment to announce] Mr 
Reginald, maam. [He withdraws when Reginald en- 
ters]. 

The General [beside himself] Well, dash my but- 
tons! ! 

Reginald is just the man Lesbia has described. He is 
hardened and tough physically, and hasty and boyish in 
his manner and speech, belonging as he does to the large 
class of English gentlemen of property (solicitor-man- 
aged) who have never developed intellectually since their 
schooldays. He is a muddled, rebellious , hasty, untidy, 
forgetful, always late sort of man, who very evidently 
needs the care of a capable woman, and has never been 
lucky or attractive enough to get it. All the same, a 
likeable man, from whom nobody apprehends any malice 
nor expects any achievement. In everything but years 
he is younger than his brother the General. 

Reginald [coming forward between the General and 
Mrs Bridgenorth] Alice: it's no use. I cant stay away 
from Edith's wedding. Good morning, Lesbia. How are 
you. Boxer? [He offers the General his hand]. 

The General [with crushing stiffness] I was just 
telling Alice, sir, that if jou entered this house, I should 
leave it. 

Reginald. Well, dont let me detain you, old chap. 
When you start calling people. Sir, youre not particu- 
larly good company. 

Lesbia. Dont you begin to quarrel. That wont 
improve the situation. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. I think you might have waited 
until you got my answer, Rejjy. 

Reginald. It's so jolly easy to say No in a letter. 
Wont you let me stay? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. How can I ? Leo's coming. 



Getting Married 225 

Reginald. Well, she wont mind. 

The General. Wont r ind ! ! ! ! ! 

Lesbia. Dont talk nonsense, Rejjy; and be off with 
you. 

The General [^with biting sarcasm] At school you 
had a theory that women liked being knocked down, I 
remember. 

Reginald. Youre a nice, chivalrous, brotherly sort 
of swine, you are. 

The General. Mr Bridgenorth: are you going to 
leave this house or am I ? 

Reginald. You are, I hope. [He emphasizes his in- 
tention to stay hy sitting down]. 

The General. Alice: will you allow me to be driven 
from Edith's wedding by this — 

Lesbia \warningly] Boxer! 

The General. — by this Respondent? Is Edith to 
be given away by him? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Certainly not. Reginald: you 
were not asked to come; and I have asked you to go. 
You know how fond I am of Leo; and you know what 
she would feel if she came in and found you here. 

Collins [again apearing in the tower] Mrs Reg- 
inald, maam. 

Lesbia TNo, no. Ask her to — [All three 

Mrs Bridgenorth ■< Oh how unfortunate ! clamoring 
The General [Well, dash my buttons ! together]. 

It is too late: Leo is already in the kitchen. Collins 
goes out, mutely abandoning a situation which he de- 
plores but has been unable to save. 

Leo is very pretty, very youthful, very restless, and 
consequently very charming to people who are touched by 
youth and beauty, as tvell as to those who regard young 
women as more or less appetising lollipops, and dont re- 
gard old women at all. Coldly studied, Leo's restless- 



226 Getting Married 

ness is much less lovable than the hittenishness which 
comes from a rich and fresh vitality. She is a born 
fusser about herself and everybody else for whom she 
feels responsible ; and her vanity causes her to exaggerate 
her responsibilities officiously. All her fussing is about 
little things; but she often calls them by big names, such 
as Art, the Divine Spark, the world, motherhood, good 
breeding, the Universe, the Creator, or anything else that 
happens to strike her imagination as sounding intellectu- 
ally important. She has more than common imagination 
and no more than common conception and penetration; 
so that she is always on the high horse about words and 
always in the perambidator about things. Considering 
herself clever, thoughtful, and superior to ordinary tveak- 
nesses and prejudices, she recklessly attaches herself to 
clever men on that understanding, with the result that 
they are first delighted, then exasperated, and finally 
bored. When marrying Reginald she told her friends 
that there was a great deal in him which needed bringing 
out. If she were a middle-aged man she would be the 
terror of his club. Being a pretty young woman, she is 
forgiven everything, proving that " Tout comprendre, 
c'est tout pardonner " is an error, the fact being that 
the secret of forgiving everything is to understand 
nothing. 

She runs in fussily, full of her own importance, and 
swoops on Lesbia, who is much less disposed to spoil her 
than Mrs Bridgenorth is. But Leo affects a special in- 
timacy with Lesbia, as of two thinkers among the Phil- 
istines. 

Leo \to Lesbia, kissing her] Good morning. [Com- 
ing to Mrs Bridgenorth] How do, Alice? [Passing on 
towards the hearth] Why so gloomy, General? [Reg- 
inald rises between her and the General] Oh, Rejjy! 
What will the King's Proctor say? 

Reginald. Damn the King's Proctor! 



Getting Married 227 

Leo. Naughty. Well, I suppose I must kiss you; 
but dont any of you tell. [*S/te kisses him. They can 
hardly believe their eyes]. Have you kept all your 
promises ? 

Reginald. Oh, dont begin bothering about those — 

Leo [insisting] Have? You? Kept? Your? Prom- 
ises? Have you rubbed your head with the lotion every 
night ? 

Reginald. Yes, yes. Nearly every ^ight. 

Leo. Nearly ! I know what that means. Have you 
worn your liver pad? 

The General [solmenly] Leo: forgiveness is one of 
the most beautiful traits in a woman's nature; but there 
are things that should not be forgiven to a man. When a 
man knocks a woman down [Leo gives a little shriek of 
laughter and collapses on a chair next Mrs Bridgenorth, 
on her left] — 

Reginald [sardotiically] The man that would raise 
his hand to a woman, save in the way of a kindness, is 
unworthy the name of Bridgenorth. [He sits down at 
the end of the table nearest the hearth]. 

The General [m^lch huffed] Oh, well, if Leo does 
not mind, of course I have no more to say. But I think 
you might, out of consideration for the family, beat your 
wife in private and not in the presence of the gardener. 

Reginald [out of patience] Whats the good of beat- 
ing your wife unless theres a witness to prove it after- 
wards? You dont suppose a man beats his wife for the 
fun of it, do you? How could she have got her divorce 
if I hadnt beaten her? Nice state of things, that! 

The General \^gasping] Do you mean to tell me 
that you did it in cold blood? simply to get rid of your 
wife? / 

Reginald. No, I didn't: I did it to get her rid of 
me. What would you do if you were fool enough to 
marry a woman thirty years younger than yourself, and 



228 Getting Married 

then found that she didnt care for you, and was in love 
with a young fellow with a face like a mushroom. 

Leo. He has not. [Bursting into tears] And you 
are most unkind to say I didnt care for you. Nobody 
could have been fonder of you. 

Reginald. A nice way of shewing your fondness ! I 
had to go out and dig that flower bed all over with my 
own hands to soften it. I had to pick all the stones out 
of it. And then she complained that I hadnt done it 
properly, because she got a worm down her neck. I had 
to go to Brighton with a poor creature who took a fancy 
to me on the way down, and got conscientious scruples 
about committing perjury after dinner. I had to put 
her down in the hotel book as Mrs Reginald Bridge- 
north : Leo's name ! Do you know what that feels like 
to a decent man ? Do you know what a decent man feels 
about his wife's name ? How would you like to go into a 
hotel before all the waiters and people with — with that 
on your arm? Not that it was the poor girl's fault, of 
course; only she started crying because I couldnt stand 
her touching me ; and now she keeps writing to me. And 
then I'm held up in the public court for cruelty and 
adultery, and turned away from Edith's wedding by 
Alice, and lectured by you! a bachelor, and a precious 
green one at that. What do you know about it? 

The General. Am I to understand that the whole 
case was one of collusion? 

Reginald. Of course it was. Half the cases are 
collusions: what are people to do? [The General, pass- 
ing his hand dazedly over his bewildered brow, sinks into 
the railed chair]. And what do you take me for, that 
you should have the cheek to pretend to believe all that 
rot about my knocking Leo about and leaving her for — 
for a — a — Ugh ! you should have seen her. 

The General. This is perfectly astonishing to me. 
Why did you do it? Why did Leo allow it? 



Getting Married 229 

Reginald. Youd better ask her. 

Leo [still in tears] I'm sure I never thought it would 
be so horrid for Rejjy. I offered honorably to do it my- 
self, and let him divorce me; but he wouldnt. And he 
said himself that it was the only way to do it — that it 
was the law that he should do it that way. I never saw 
that hateful creature until that day in Court. If he had 
only shewn her to me before, I should never have 
allowed it. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. You did all this for Leo's sake, 
Rejjy? 

Reginald [with an unbearable sense of injury] I 
shouldnt mind a bit if it were for Leo's sake. But to 
have to do it to make room for that mushroom-faced ser- 
pent — ! 

The General [jumping up] What right had he to 
be made room for? Are you in your senses? What 
right ? 

Reginald. The right of being a young man, suitable 
to a young woman. I had no right at my age to marry 
Leo: she knew no more about life than a child. 

Leo. I knew a great deal more about it than a great 
baby like you. I'm sure I dont know how youll get on 
with no one to take care of you : I often lie awake at night 
thinking about it. And now youve made me thoroughly 
miserable. 

Reginald. Serve you right! [She weeps]. There: 
dont get into a tantrum, Leo. 

Lesbia. May one ask who is the mushroom-faced ser- 
pent? 

Leo. He isnt. 

Reginald. Sinjon Hotchkiss, of course. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Sinjon Hotchkiss! Why, he's 
coming to the wedding! 

Reginald. What! In that case I'm off [he makes 
for the tower] . 



230 



Getting Married 



Leo '] r [seizing him] No 

you shant. You prom- 
ised to be nice to 
him. 
The General [all four rush- No, dont go, old 
ingafterhim chap. Not from 
and captur- ] Edith's wedding. 
Mrs Bridge- ing him on Oh, do stay, Rej- 
NORTH the thresh- jy. I shall really be 

old] hurt if you desert us. 

Lesbia Better stay, Reg- 

inald. You must meet 
^him sooner or later. 
Reginald. A moment ago, when I wanted to stay, 
you were all shoving me out of the house. Now that I 
want to go, you wont let me. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. I shall send a note to Mr Hotch- 
kiss not to come, 

Leo [weeping again] Oh, Alice! [She comes bach 
to her chair, heartbroken], 

Reginald [out of patience] Oh well, let her have her 
way. Let her have her mushroom. Let him come. Let 
them all come. 

He crosses the kitchen to the oak chest and sits sulkily 
on it. Mrs Bridgenorth shrugs her shoulders and sits at 
the table in Reginald's neighborhood listening in placid 
helplessness. Lesbia, out of patience with Leo's tears, 
goes into the garden and sits there near the door, snuffing 
up the open air in her relief from the domestic stuffi- 
ness of Reginald's affairs. 

Leo. It's so cruel of you to go on pretending that I 
dont care for you, Rejjy. 

Reginald [bitterly] She explained to me that it was 
only that she had exhausted my conversation. 

The General [coming paternally to Leo] My dear 
girl : all the conversation in the world has been exhausted 



Getting Married 231 

long ago. Heaven knows I have exhausted the conversa- 
tion of the British Army these thirty years; but I dont 
leave it on that account. 

Leo. It's not that Ive exhausted it; but he will keep 
on repeating it when I want to read or go to sleep. And 
Sin j on amuses me. He's so clever. 

The General [stung] Ha ! The old complaint. 
You all want geniuses to marry. This demand for clever 
men is ridiculous. Somebody must marry the plain, hon- 
est, stupid fellows. Have you thought of that? 

Leo. But there are such lots of stupid women to 
marry. Why do they want to marry us? Besides, Rejjy 
knows that I'm quite fond of him. I like him because he 
wants me; and I like Sinjon because I want him. I feel 
that I have a duty to Rejjy. 

The General. Precisely : you have. 

Leo. And, of course, Sinjon has the same duty to me. 

The General. Tut, tut! 

Leo. Oh, how silly the law is ! Why cant I marry 
them both? 

The General [shocked] Leo ! 

Leo. Well, I love them both. I should like to 
marry a lot of men. I should like to have Rejjy for 
every day, and Sinjon for concerts and theatres and 
going out in the evenings, and some great austere saint 
for about once a year at the end of the season, and some 
perfectly blithering idiot of a boy to be quite wicked 
with. I so seldom feel wicked; and, when I do, it's such 
a pity to waste it merely because it's too silly to confess 
to a real grown-up man. 

Reginald. This is the kind of thing, you know — 
[Helplessly] Well, there it is! 

The General [decisively] Alice: this is a job for 
the Barmecide. He's a Bishop: it's his duty to talk to 
Leo. I can stand a good deal; but when it comes to flat 
polygamy and polyandry, we ought to do something. 



232 Getting Married 

Mrs Bridgenorth [going to the study door] Do 
come here a moment, Alfred. We're in a difficulty. 

The Bishop [ivithin] Ask Collins, I'm busy. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Collins wont do. It's something 
very serious. Do come just a moment, dear. [When 
she hears him coming she takes a chair at the nearest end 
of the table]. 

The Bishop comes out of his study. He is still a slim 
active man, spare of flesh, a7id younger by temperament 
than his brothers. He has a delicate skin, fine hands, a 
salient nose with chin to match, a short beard which ac- 
centuates his sharp chin by bristling forward, clever hu- 
morous eyes, not without a glint of mischief in them, 
ready bright speech, and the ways of a successful man 
who is always interested in himself and generally rather 
well pleased with himself. When Lesbia hears his voice 
she turns her chair towards him, and presently rises and 
stands in the doorway listening to the conversation. 

The Bishop [going to Leo] Good morning, my dear. 
Hullo ! Youve brought Reginald with you. Thats very 
nice of you. Have you reconciled them. Boxer? 

The General. Reconciled them ! Why, man, the 
whole divorce was a put-up job. She wants to marry 
some fellow named Hotchkiss. 

Reginald. A fellow with a face like — 

Leo. You shant, Rejjy. He has a very fine face. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. And now she says she wants to 
marry both of them, and a lot of other people as well. 

Leo. I didnt say I wanted to marry them: I only 
said I should like to marry them. 

The Bishop. Quite a nice distinction, Leo. 

Leo. Just occasionally, you know. 

The Bishop [sitting down cosily beside her] Quite 
so. Sometimes a poet, sometimes a Bishop, sometimes a 
fairy prince, sometimes somebody quite indescribable, 
and sometimes nobody at all. 



Getting INIamed 233 

Leo. Yes: thats just it. How did you know? 

The Bishop. Oh, I should say most imaginative and 
cultivated yoiuig women feel like that. I wouldnt give 
a rap for one who didnt. Shakespear pointed out long 
ago that a woman wanted a Simday husband as well as 
a weekday one. But, as usual, he didnt follow up the 
idea. 

The General [aghast] Am I to understand — 

The Bishop [cutting him short] Now, Boxer, am I 
the Bishop or are you? 

The General [sulJdly] You. 

The Bishop. Then dont ask me are you to under- 
stand. " Yours not to reason why: yours but to do and 
die " — 

The General. Oh, very well: go on. I'm not 
clever. Only a silly soldier man. Ha ! Go on. [He 
throws himself into the railed chair, as one prepared for 
the worst], 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Alfred: dont tease Boxer. 

The Bishop. If we are going to discuss ethical ques- 
tions we must begin by giving the devil fair play. Boxer 
never does. England never does. We always assume that 
the devil is guilty; and we wont allow him to prove his 
innocence, because it would be against public morals if 
he succeeded. We used to do the same with prisoners 
accused of high treason. And the consequence is that we 
overreach ourselves; and the devil gets the better of us 
after all. Perhaps thats what most of us intend him 
to do. 

The General. Alfred: we asked you here to preach 
to Leo. You are preaching at me instead. I am not con- 
scious of having said or done anything that calls for that 
unsolicited attention. 

The Bishop. But poor little Leo has only told the 
simple truth; whilst you. Boxer, are striking moral atti- 
tudes. 



234 Getting Married 

The General. I suppose thats an epigram. I dont 
understand epigrams. I'm only a silly soldier man. Ha! 
But I can put a plain question. Is Leo to be encouraged 
to be a polygamist .'' 

The Bishop, Remember the British Empire, Boxer. 
Youre a British General, you know. 

The General. What has that to do with polygamy? 

The Bishop. Well, the great majority of our fellow- 
subjects are polygamists. I cant as a British Bishop 
insult them by speaking disrespectfully of polygamy. 
It's a very interesting question. Many very interesting 
men have been polygamists: Solomon, Mahomet, and our 
friend the Duke of — of — hm ! I never can remember 
his name. 

The General. It would become you better, Alfred, 
to send that silly girl back to her husband and her duty 
than to talk clever and mock at your religion. " What 
God hath joined together let no man put asunder." Re- 
member that. 

The Bishop. Dont be afraid, Boxer. What God 
hath joined together no man ever shall put asunder: God 
will take care of that. [To Leo] By the way, who was 
it that joined you and Reginald, my dear? 

Leo. It was that awful little curate that afterwards 
drank, and travelled first class with a third-class ticket, 
and then tried to go on the stage. But they wouldnt 
have him. He called himself Egerton Fotheringay. 

The Bishop. Well, whom Egerton Fotheringay hath 
joined, let Sir Gorell Barnes put asunder by all means. 

The General. I may be a silly soldier man; but I 
call this blasphemy. 

The Bishop [gravely] Better for me to take the 
name of Mr Egerton Fotheringay in earnest than for 
you to take a higher name in vain. 

Lesbia. Cant you three brothers ever meet without 
quarrelling ? 



Getting Married 235 

The Bishop [mildly] This is not quarrelling, Les- 
bia: it's only English family life. Good morning. 

Leo. You know, Bishop, it's very dear of you to take 
my part; but I'm not sure that I'm not a little shocked. 

The Bishop. Then I think Ive been a little more 
successful than Boxer in getting you into a proper frame 
of mind. 

The General [snorting] Ha ! 

Leo. Not a bit; for now I'm going to shock you 
worse than ever. I think Solomon was an old beast. 

The Bishop. Precisely what you ought to think of 
him, my dear. Dont apologize. 

The General [more shocked] Well, but hang it! 
Solomon was in the Bible. And, after all, Solomon was 
Solomon. 

Leo. And I stick to it: I still want to have a lot of 
interesting men to know quite intimately — to say every- 
thing I think of to them, and have them say everything 
they think of to me. 

The Bishop. So you shall, my dear, if you are lucky. 
But you know you neednt marry them all. Think of all 
the buttons you would have to sew on. Besides, nothing 
is more dreadful than a husband who keeps telling you 
everything he thinks, and always wants to know what 
you think. 

Leo [struck by this] Well, thats very true of Rejjy: 
in fact, thats why I had to divorce him. 

The Bishop [condoling] Yes: he repeats himself 
dreadfully, doesnt he? 

Reginald. Look here, Alfred. If I have my faults, 
let her find them out for herself without your help. 

The Bishop. She has found them all out already, 
Reginald. 

Leo [a little huffily] After all, there are worse men 
than Reginald. I daresay he's not so clever as you; but 
still he's not such a fool as you seem to think him ! 



236 Getting Married 

The Bishop. Quite right, dear: stand up for your 
husband. I hope you will always stand up for all your 
husbands. [He rises and goes to the hearth, where he 
stands complacently rvith his back to the fireplace, beam- 
ing at them all as at a roomful of children], 

Leo. Please dont talk as if I wanted to marry a 
whole regiment. For me there can never be more than 
two. I shall never love anybody but Rejjy and Sin j on. 

Reginald. A man with a face like a — 

Leo. I wont have it, Rejjy. It's disgusting. 

The Bishop. You see, my dear, youll exhaust Sin- 
jon's conversation too in a week or so. A man is like a 
phonograph with half-a-dozen records. You soon get 
tired of them all; and yet you have to sit at table whilst 
he reels them off to every new visitor. In the end you 
have to be content with his common humanity ; and when 
you come down to that, you find out about men what a 
great English poet of my acquaintance used to say about 
women: that they all taste alike. Marry whom you 
please: at the end of a month he'll be Reginald over 
again. It wasnt worth changing: indeed it wasnt. 

Leo. Then it's a mistake to get married. 

The Bishop. It is, my dear; but it's a much bigger 
mistake not to get married. 

The General \ rising] Ha! You hear that, Lesbia? 
[He joins her at the garden dooi']. 

Lesbia. Thats only an epigram. Boxer. 

The General. Sound sense, Lesbia. When a man 
talks rot, thats epigram : when he talks sense, then I 
agree with him. 

Reginald [coming off the oak chest and looking at his 
watch] It's getting late. Wheres Edith? Hasnt she 
got into her veil and orange blossoms yet? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Do go and hurry her, Lesbia, 

Lesbia [going out through the tower] Come with me, 
Leo. 



Getting Married 237 

Leo [following Lesbia 02it] Yes, certainly. 

The Bishop goes over to his wife and sits down, taking 
her hand and kissing it by way of begiiining a conver- 
sation with her. 

The Bishop. Alice: Ive had another letter from the 
mysterious lady who cant spell. I like that woman's 
letters. Theres an intensity of passion in them that fas- 
cinates me. 

Mrs Bridgenorth, Do you mean Incognita Appas- 
sionata } 

The Bishop. Yes. 

The General [turning abruptly : he has been looking 
out into the garden^ Do you mean to say that women 
write love-letters to you? 

The Bishop. Of course. 

The General. They never do to me. 

The Bishop. The army doesnt attract women: the 
Church does. 

Reginald. Do you consider it right to let them? 
They may be married women, you know. 

The Bishop. They always are. This one is. [To 
Mrs Bridgenorth] Dont you think her letters are quite 
the best love-letters I get? [To the two men] Poor 
Alice has to read my love-letters aloud to me at break- 
fast, when theyre worth it. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. There really is something fasci- 
nating about Incognita. She never gives her address. 
Thats a good sign. 

The General. Mf! No assignations, you mean? 

The Bishop. Oh yes: she began the correspond- 
ence by making a very curious but very natural assigna- 
tion. She wants me to meet her in heaven. I hope I 
shall. 

The General. Well, I must say I hope not, Alfred. 
I hope not. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. She says she is happily married. 



238 Getting Married 

and that love is a necessary of life to her, but that she 
must have, high above all her lovers — 

The Bishop. She has several apparently — 

Mrs Bridgenorth. — some great man who will 
never know her, never touch her, as she is on earth, but 
whom she can meet in heaven when she has risen above 
all the everyday vulgarities of earthly love. 

The Bishop [rising] Excellent. Very good for her; 
and no trouble to me. Everybody ought to have one of 
these idealizations, like Dante's Beatrice. [He clasps 
his hands behind him, and strolls to the hearth and back, 
singing] . 

Lesbia appears in the tower, rather perturbed. 

Lesbia. Alice: will you come upstairs.'^ Edith is not 
dressed. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [rising] Not dressed! Does she 
know what hour it is ? 

Lesbia. She has locked herself into her room, read- 
ing- 

The Bishop's song ceases; he stops dead in his stroll. 

The General. Reading! 

The Bishop. What is she reading? 

Lesbia. Some pamphlet that came by the eleven 
o'clock post. She wont come out. She wont open the 
door. And she says she doesnt know whether she's going 
to be married or not till she's finished the pamphlet. Did 
you ever hear such a thing? Do come and speak to her. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Alfred: you had better go. 

The Bishop. Try Collins. 

Lesbia. Weve tried Collins already. He got all that 
Ive told you out of her through the keyhole. Come, 
Alice. [She vanishes. Mrs Bridgenorth hurries after 
her]. 

The Bishop. This means a delay. I shall go back 
to my work [he makes for the study door]. 

Reginald. What are you working at now? 



Getting Married 239 

The Bishop [stopping^ A chapter in my history of 
marriage. I'm just at the Roman business, you know. 

The General [coming from the garden door to the 
chair Mrs Bridgenorth has just left, and sitting down] 
Not more Ritualism, I hope, Alfred? 

The Bishop. Oh no. I mean ancient Rome. [He 
seats himself on the edge of the table]. Ivc just come 
to the period when the propertied classes refused to get 
married and went in for marriage settlements instead. A 
few of the oldest families stuck to the marriage tradition 
so as to keep up the supply of vestal virgins, who had to 
be legitimate ; but nobody else dreamt of getting married. 
It's all very interesting, because we're coming to that 
here in England; except that as we dont require any 
vestal virgins, nobody will get married at all, except the 
poor, perhaps. 

The General. You take it devilishly coolly. Regi- 
nald: do you think the Barmecide's quite sane? 

Reginald. No worse than ever he was. 

The General [to the Bishop] Do you mean to say 
you believe such a thing will ever happen in England as 
that respectable people will give up being married? 

The Bishop. In England especially they will. In 
other countries the introduction of reasonable divorce 
laws will save the situation ; but in England we always 
let an institution strain itself until it breaks. Ive told 
our last four Prime Ministers that if they didnt make our 
marriage laws reasonable there would be a strike against 
marriage, and that it would begin among the propertied 
classes, where no Government would dare to interfere 
with it. 

Reginald. What did they say to that? 

The Bishop. The usual thing. Quite agreed with 
me, but were sure that they were the only sensible men 
in the world, and that the least hint of marriage reform 
would lose them the next election. And then lost it all 



240 Getting Married 

the same: on cordite, on drink, on Chinese labor in South 
Africa, on all sorts of trumpery. 

Reginald [^lurching across the kitchen towards the 
hearth rvith his hands in his pockets] It's no use: they 
wont listen to our sort. [Turning on them'\ Of course 
they have to make you a Bishop and Boxer a General, 
because, after all, their blessed rabble of snobs and cads 
and half-starved shopkeepers cant do government work; 
and the bounders and week-enders are too lazy and vul- 
gar. Theyd simply rot without us ; but what do they 
ever do for us ? what attention do they ever pay to what 
we say and what we want? I take it that we Bridge- 
norths are a pretty typical English family of the sort 
that has always set things straight and stuck up for the 
right to think and believe according to our conscience. 
But nowadays we are expected to dress and eat as the 
week-end bounders do, and to think and believe as the 
converted cannibals of Central Africa do, and to lie down 
and let every snob and every cad and every halfpenny 
journalist walk over us. Why, theres not a newspaper 
in England today that represents what I call solid 
Bridgenorth opinion and tradition. Half of them read 
as if they were published at the nearest mother's meet- 
ing, and the other half at the nearest motor garage. Do 
you call these chaps gentlemen.^ Do you call them Eng- 
lishmen? I dont. [He throws himself disgustedly into 
the nearest chair]. 

The General [excited by Reginald's eloquence] Do 
you see my uniform? What did Collins say? It strikes 
the eye. It was meant to. I put it on expressly to give 
the modern army bounder a smack in the eye. Some- 
body has to set a right example by beginning. Well, let 
it be a Bridgenorth. I believe in family blood and tradi- 
tion, by George. 

The Bishop [musing] I wonder who will begin the 
stand against marriage. It must come some day. I was 



Getting Married 241 

married myself before I'd thought about it; and even if 
I had thought about it I was too much in love with Alice 
to let anytlaing stand in the way. But, you know, Ive 
seen one of our daughters after another — Ethel, Jane, 
Fanny, and Christina and Florence — go out at that door 
in their veils and orange blossoms ; and Ive always won- 
dered whether theyd have gone quietly if theyd known 
what they were doing. Ive a horrible misgiving about 
that pamphlet. All_jprogress -means war _with Society. 
Heaven forbid that Edith should be one of the com- 
batants ! 

St John Hotchhiss comes into the tower ushered by 
Collins. He is a very smart young gentleman of twenty- 
nine or thereabouts, correct in dress to the last thread 
of his collar, but too much preoccupied with his ideas to 
be embarrassed by any concern as to his appearance. He 
talks about himself with energetic gaiety. He talks to 
other people with a sweet forbearance (implying a kindly 
consideratio7i for their stupidity^ which infuriates those 
whom he does not succeed in amusing. They either lose 
their tempers with him or try in vain to snub him. 

Collins [announcing] Mr Hotchkiss. [He with- 
draws]. 

HoTCHKiss [clapping Reginald gaily on the shoulder 
as he passes him] Tootle loo, Rejjy. 

Reginald [curtly, without rising or turning his head^ 
Morning. 

Hotchkiss. Good morning, Bishop. 

The Bishop [coming off the table]. What on earth 
are you doing here, Sinjon? You belong to the bride- 
groom's party: youve no business here until after the 
ceremony. 

Hotchkiss. Yes, I know: thats just it. May I have 
a word with you in private? Rejjy or any of the fam- 
ily wont matter; but — [he glances at the General, who 
has risen rather stiffly, as he strongly disapproves of 



242 Getting Married 

the part played by Hotchkiss in Reginald's domestic 
affairs]. 

The Bishop. All right, Sin j on. This is our brother. 
General Bridgenorth. [He goes to the hearth and posts 
himself there, with his hands clasped behind him], 

Hotchkiss. Oh, good ! [He turns to the General, 
and takes out a card-case] . As you are in the service, 
allow me to introduce myself. Read my card, please. 
[He presents his card to the astonished General]. 

The General [reading] " Mr St John Hotchkiss, 
the Celebrated Coward, late Lieutenant in the l65th 
Fusiliers." 

Reginald [with a chuckle] He was sent back from 
South Africa because he funked an order to attack, and 
spoiled his commanding officer's plan. 

The General [very gravely] I remember the case 
now. I had forgotten the name. I'll not refuse your 
acquaintance, Mr Hotchkiss ; partly because youre my 
brother's guest, and partly because Ive seen too much 
active service not to know that every man's nerve plays 
him false at one time or another, and that some very hon- 
orable men should never go into action at all, because 
theyre not built that way. But if I were you I should 
not use that visiting card. No doubt it's an honorable 
trait in your character that you dont wish any man to 
give you his hand in ignorance of your disgrace ; but you 
had better allow us to forget. We wish to forget. It 
isnt your disgrace alone: it's a disgrace to the army and 
to all of us. Pardon my plain speaking. 

Hotchkiss [sunnily] My dear General, I dont know 
what fear means in the military sense of the word. Ive 
fought seven duels with the sabre in Italy and Austria, 
and one with pistols in France, without turning a hair. 
There was no other way in which I could vindicate my 
motives in refusing to make that attack at Smutsfontein. 
I dont pretend to be a brave man. I'm afraid of wasps. 



Getting Married 243 

I'm afraid of cats. In spite of the voice of reason, I'm 
afraid of ghosts; and twice Ive fled across Europe from 
false alarms of cholera. But afraid to fight I am not. 
[He turns gaily to Reginald and slaps him on the shoul- 
der]. Eh, Rejjy.'' [Reginald grunts'\. 

The General. Then why did you not do your duty 
at Smuts fontein.'' 

HoTCHKiss. I did my duty — my higher duty. If I 
had made that attack, my commanding officer's plan 
would have been successful, and he would have been pro- 
moted. Now I happen to think that the British Army 
should be commanded by gentlemen, and by gentlemen 
alone. This man was not a gentleman. I sacrificed my 
military career — I faced disgrace and social ostracism — 
rather than give that man his chance. 

The General [generously indignant] Your com- 
manding officer, sir, was my friend Major Billiter. 

HoTCHKiss. Precisely, What a name! 

The General. And pray, sir, on what ground do 
you dare allege that Major Billiter is not a gentleman.'' 

HoTCHKiss. By an infallible sign: one of those tri- 
fles that stamp a man. He eats rice pudding with a 
spoon. 

The General [very angry] Confound you, / eat 
rice pudding with a spoon. Now ! 

HoTCHKiss. Oh, so do I, frequently. But there are 
ways of doing these things. Billiter 's way was unmis- 
takable. 

The General, Well, I'll tell you something now. 
When I thought you were only a coward, I pitied you, 
and would have done what I could to help you back to 
your place in Society — 

HoTCHKiss [interrupting him^ Thank you: I havnt 
lost it. My motives have been fully appreciated. I was 
made an honorary member of two of the smartest clubs 
in, London when the truth came out. 



244 Getting Married 

The General. Well, sir, those clubs consist of 
snobs; and you are a jumping, bounding, prancing, 
snorting snob yourself. 

The Bishop [amused, but hospitably remonstrant] 
My dear Boxer ! 

HoTCHKiss [delighted] How kind of you to say so, 
General! Youre quite right: I am a snob. Why not.'' 
The whole strength of England lies in the fact that the 
enormous majority of the English people are snobs. 
They insult poverty. They despise vulgarity. They 
love nobility. They admire exclusiveness. They will 
not obey a man risen from the ranks. They never trust 
one of their own class. I agree with them. I share their 
instincts. In my undergraduate days I was a Republi- 
can — a Socialist. I tried hard to feel toward a common 
man as I do towards a duke. I couldnt. Neither can 
you. Well, why should we be ashamed of this aspiration 
towards what is above us ? Why dont I say that an hon- 
est man's the noblest work of God.'' Because I dont 
think so. If he's not a gentleman, I dont care whether 
he's honest or not: I shouldnt let his son marry my 
daughter. And thats the test, mind. Thats the test. 
You feel as I do. You are a snob in fact: I am a snob, 
not only in fact, but on principle. I shall go down in 
history, not as the first snob, but as the first avowed 
champion of English snobbery, and its first martyr in the 
army. The navy boasts two such martj^rs in Captains 
Kirby and Wade, who were shot for refusing to fight 
under Admiral Benbow, a promoted cabin boy. I have 
always envied them their glory. 

The General. As a British General, sir, I have to 
inform you that if any officer under my command violated 
the sacred equality of our profession by putting a single 
jot of his duty or his risk on the shoulders of the hum- 
blest drummer boy, I'd shoot him with my own hand. 

Hotchkiss. That sentiment is not your equality. 



Getting Married 245 

General, but your superiority. Ask the Bishop. [He 
seats himself on the edge of the table] . 

The Bishop. I cant support you, Sin j on. My pro- 
fession also compels me to turn my back on snobbery. 
You see, I have to do such a terribly democratic thing to 
every child that is brought to me. Without distinction of 
class I have to confer on it a rank so high and awful that 
all the grades in Debrett and Burke seem like the medals 
they give children in Infant Schools in comparison. I'm 
not allowed to make any class distinction. They are all 
soldiers and servants, not officers and masters. 

HoTCHKiss. Ah, youre quoting the Baptism service. 
Thats not a bit real, you know. If I may say so, you 
would both feel so much more at peace with yourselves 
if you would acknowledge and confess your real convic- 
tions. You know you dont really think a Bishop the 
equal of a curate, or a lieutenant in a line regiment the 
equal of a general. 

The Bishop. Of course I do. I was a curate myself. 

The General. And I was a lieutenant in a line regi- 
ment. 

Reginald. And I was nothing. But we're all our 
own and one another's equals, arnt we.'' So perhaps 
when youve quite done talking about yourselves, we shall 
get to whatever business Sin j on came about. 

HoTCHKiss [coming off the table hastily] Oh! true, 
my dear fellow. I beg a thousand pardons. It's about 
the wedding? 

The General. What about the wedding? 

HoTCHKiss. Well, we cant get our man up to the 
scratch. Cecil has locked himself in his room and wont 
see or speak to any one. I went up to his room and 
banged at the door. I told him I should look through 
the keyhole if he didnt answer. I looked through the 
keyhole. He was sitting on his bed, reading a book. 
[Reginald rises in consternation. The General recoils]. 



246 Getting Married 

I told him not to be an ass, and so forth. He said he 
was not going to budge until he had finished the book. 
I asked him did he know what time it was, and whether 
he happened to recollect that he had a rather important 
appointment to marry Edith. He said the sooner I 
stopped interrupting him, the sooner he'd be ready. 
Then he stuffed his fingers in his ears; turned over on 
his elbows; and buried himself in his beastly book. I 
couldnt get another word out of him; so I thought I'd 
better come here and warn you. 

Reginald. This looks to me like a practical joke. 
Theyve arranged it between them. 

The Bishop. No. Edith has no sense of humor. 
And Ive never seen a man in a jocular mood on his wed- 
ding morning. 

Collins appears in the tower, ushering in the bride- 
groom, a young gentleman with good looks of the serious 
kind, somewhat careworn by an exacting conscience, and 
just now distracted by insoluble problems of conduct. 

Collins [announcing] Mr Cecil Sykes. [He retires], 

HoTCHKiss. Look here, Cecil: this is all wrong. 
Youve no business here until after the wedding. Hang 
it, man ! youre the bridegroom. 

Sykes [coming to the Bishop, and addressing him 
with dogged desperation] Ive come here to say this. 
When I proposed to Edith I was in utter ignorance of 
what I was letting myself in for legally. Having given 
my word, I will stand to it. You have me at your mercy : 
marry me if you insist. But take notice that I protest. 

[He sits down distractedly in the railed chair]. 
-\ f 

The General. What the devil do you 

[Both jnean by this? What 

highly < the — 
Reginald. incensed] Confound your imperti- 

nence, what do you — 



>< 



Getting Married 247 

HoTCHKiss. 1 fEasy, Rejjy. Easy, old man. Steady, 
steady, steady. [Reginald subsides 
into his chair. Hotchhiss sits on 
his right, appeasing /zm]. 

The Bishop. No, please, Rej. Control yourself. 
Boxer, I beg you. 

The General. I tell you I cant control myself. 
Ive been controlling myself for the last half-hour until 
I feel like bursting, [i/e sits down furiously at the end 
of the table next the study'\. 

Sykes [^pointing to the simmering Reginald and the 
boiling General] Thats just it, Bishop. Edith is her 
uncle's niece. She cant control herself any more than 
they can. And she's a Bishop's daughter. That means 
that she's engaged in social work of all sorts : organizing 
shop assistants and sweated work girls and all that. 
When her blood boils about it (and it boils at least once 
a week) she doesnt care what she says. 

Reginald. Well: you knew that when you proposed 
to her. 

Sykes. Yes ; but I didnt know that when we were 
married I should be legally responsible if she libelled 
anybody, though all her property is protected against me 
as if I were the lowest thief and cadger. This morning 
somebody sent me Belfort Bax's essays on Men's 
Wrongs ; and they have been a perfect eye-opener to me. 
Bishop: I'm not thinking of myself: I would face any- 
thing for Edith. But my mother and sisters are wholly 
dependent on my property. I'd rather have to cut off 
an inch from my right arm than a hundred a year from 
my mother's income. I owe everything to her care of me. 

Edith, in dressing-jacket and petticoat, comes in 
through the tower, swiftly and determinedly, pamphlet 
in hand, principles up in arms, more of a bishop than her 
father, yet as much a gentlewoman as her mother. She 
is the typical spoilt child of a clerical household: almost 



248 Getting Married 

as terrible a product as the typical spoilt child of a Bo- 
hemian household: that is, all her childish affectations of 
conscientious scruple and religious impulse have been 
applauded and deferred to until she has become an ethi- 
cal snob of the first water. Her father's sense of humor 
and her mother's placid balance have done something to 
save her humanity ; but her impetuous temper and ener- 
getic will, unrestrained by any touch of humor or scep- 
ticism, carry everything before them. Imperious and 
dogmatic, she takes command of the party at once. 

Edith \^standing behind Cecil's chair\ Cecil: I heard 
your voice. I must speak to you very particularly. 
Papa : go away. Go away everybody. 

The Bishop [crossing to the study door'\ I think 
there can be no doubt that Edith wishes us to retire. 
Come, [//e stands in the doorway, waiting for them to 
follow^. 

Sykes. Thats it, you see. It's just this outspoken- 
ness that makes my position hard, much as I admire her 
for it. 

Edith. Do you want me to flatter and be untruthful? 

Sykes. No, not exactly that. 

Edith. Does anybody want me to flatter and be un- 
truthful? 

HoTCHKiss. Well, since you ask me, I do. Surely 
it's the very first qualification for tolerable social inter- 
course. 

The General [^marhedly^ I hope you will always 
tell me the truth, my darling, at all events. 

Edith [cojnplacently coming to the fireplace] You 
can depend on me for that, Uncle Boxer. 

HoTCHKiss. Are you sure you have any adequate 
idea of what the truth about a military man really is ? 

Reginald [aggressivelyl Whats the^;ruth about you, 
I wonder? 

HoTCHKiss. Oh, quite unfit for publication in its en- 



Getting Married 249 

tirety. If Miss Bridgenorth begins telling it, I shall 
have to leave the room. 

Reginald. I'm not at all surprised to hear it. [Ris- 
ing] But whats it got to do with our business here 
to-day.^ Is it you thats going to be married or is it 
Edith.? 

HoTCHKiss. I'm so sorry. I get so interested in my- 
self that I thrust myself into the front of every discus- 
sion in the most insufferable way. [Reginald, with an 
exclamation of disgust, crosses the kitchen towards the 
study door]. But, my dear Rejjy, are you quite sure 
that Miss Bridgenorth is going to be married.? Are 
you, Miss Bridgenorth? 

Before Edith has time to answer her mother returns 
with Leo and Lesbia. 

Leo. Yes, here she is, of course. I told you I heard 
her dash downstairs. [She comes to the end of the table 
next the fireplace]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [transfixed in the middle of the 
kitchen] And Cecil ! ! 

Lesbia. And Sin j on! 

The Bishop. Edith wishes to speak to Cecil. [Mrs 
Bridgenorth comes to him. Lesbia goes into the garden, 
as before]. Let us go into my study. 

Leo. But she must come and dress. Look at the 
hour ! 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Come, Leo dear. [Leo follows 
her reluctantly. They are about to go into the study 
with the Bishop]. 

HoTCHKiss. Do you know. Miss Bridgenorth, I 
should most awfully like to hear what you have to say to 
poor Cecil. 

Reginald [scandalized] Well ! 

Edith. Who is poor Cecil, pray? 

HoTCHKiss. One always calls a man that on his wed- 
ding morning: I dont know why. I'm his best man, you 



250 Getting Married 

know. Dont you think it gives me a certain right to be 
present in Cecil's interest? 

The General [gravely] There is such a thing as 
delicacy, Mr Hotchkiss. 

HoTCHKiss. There is such a thing as curiosity. Gen- 
eral. 

The General [furious] Delicacy is thrown away 
here, Alfred. Edith: you had better take Sykes into the 
study. 

The group at the study door breaks up. The General 
flings himself into the last chair on the long side of the 
table, near the garden door. Leo sits at the end, next 
him, and Mrs Bridgenorth next Leo. Reginald returns 
to the oak chest, to be near Leo; and the Bishop goes to 
his wife and stands by her. 

HoTCHKiss [to Edith] Of course I'll go if you wish 
me to. But Cecil's objection to go through with it was 
so entirely on public grounds — 

Edith [rvith quick suspicion] His objection? 

Sykes. Sin j on: you have no right to say that. I ex- 
pressly said that I'm ready to go through with it. 

Edith. Cecil: do you mean to say that you have 
been raising difficulties about our marriage? 

Sykes. I raise no difficulty. But I do beg you to be 
careful what you say about people. You must remember, 
my dear, that when we are married I shall be responsi- 
ble for everything you say. Only last week you said on 
a public platform that Slattox and Chinnery were scoun- 
drels. They could have got a thousand pounds damages 
apiece from me for that if we'd been married at the 
time. 

Edith [austerely] I never said anything of the sort. 
I never stoop to mere vituperation: what would my girls 
say of me if I did ? I chose my words most carefully. I 
said they were tyrants, liars, and thieves; and so they 
are. Slattox is even worse. 



Getting Married 251 

HoTCHKiss. I'm afraid that would be at least five 
thousand pounds. 

Sykes. If it were only myself, I shouldnt care. But 
my mother and sisters ! Ive no right to sacrifice 
them. 

Edith. You neednt be alarmed. I'm not going to be 
married. 

All the rest. Not ! 

Sykes [in consternation] Edith ! Are you throwing 
me over? 

Edith. How can I ? you have been beforehand with 
me. 

Sykes. On my honor, no. All I said was that I 
didnt know the law when I asked you to be my 
wife. 

Edith. And you wouldnt have asked me if you had. 
Is that it? 

Sykes. No. I should have asked you for my sake to 
be a little more careful — not to ruin me uselessly. 

Edith. You think the truth useless? 

HoTCHKiss. Much worse than useless, I assure you. 
Frequently most mischievous. 

Edith. Sin j on: hold your tongue. You are a chat- 
terbox and a fool ! 



Mrs Bridgenorth 
The Bishop 



I [shocked] l^yt;^! 



HoTCHKiss [mildly] I shall not take an action, 
Cecil. 

Edith [to Hotchkiss] Sorry; but you are old enough 
to know better. [To the others] And now since there is 
to be no wedding, we had better get back to our work. 
Mamma: will you tell Collins to cut up the wedding cake 
into thirty-three pieces for the club girls ? My not being 
married is no reason why they should be disappointed. 
[She turns to go]. 



252 Getting Married 

HoTCHKiss [gallantly] If youll allow me to take 
Cecil's place^ Miss Bridgenorth — 

Leo. Sin j on! 

HoTCHKiss. Oh, I forgot. I beg your pardon. \_To 
Edith, apologetically] A prior engagement. 

Edith. What! You and Leo! I thought so. Well, 
hadnt you two better get married at once? I dont ap- 
prove of long engagements. The breakfast's ready: the 
cake's ready: everything's ready. I'll lend Leo my veil 
and things. 

The Bishop. I'm afraid they must wait until the 
decree is made absolute, my dear. And the license is not 
transferable. 

Edith. Oh well, it cant be helped. Is there any- 
thing else before I go off to the Club.'' 

Sykes. You dont seem much disappointed, Edith. I 
cant help saying that much. 

Edith. And you cant help looking enormously re- 
lieved, Cecil. We shant be any worse friends, shall we.'' 

Sykes [distractedly] Of course not. Still — I'm per- 
fectly ready — at least — if it were not for my mother — 
Oh, I dont know what to do. Ive been so fond of you ; 
and when the worry of the wedding was over I should 
have been so fond of you again — 

Edith [petting him] Come, come! dont make a scene, 
dear. Youre quite right. I dont think a woman doing 
public work ought to get married unless her husband 
feels about it as she does. I dont blame you at all for 
throwing me over. 

Reginald [bouncing off the chest, and passing behind 
the General to the other end of the table] No: dash it! 
I'm not going to stand this. Why is the man always to 
be put in the wrong? Be honest, Edith. Why werent 
you dressed? Were you going to throw him over? If 
you were, take your fair share of the blame; and dont 
put it all on him. 



Getting Married 253 

HoTCHKiss [sweetly] Would it not be better — 

Reginald [violently] Now look here, Hotchkiss. 
Who asked you to cut in? Is your name Edith? Am I 
your uncle? 

Hotchkiss. I wish you were: I should like to have 
an uncle, Reginald. 

Reginald. Yah ! Sykes : are you ready to marry 
Edith or are you not? 

Sykes. Ive already said that I'm quite ready. A 
promise is a promise. 

Reginald. We dont want to know whether a prom- 
ise is a promise or not. Cant you answer yes or no with- 
out spoiling it and setting Hotchkiss here grinning like 
a Cheshire cat? If she puts on her veil and goes to 
Church, will you marry her? 

Sykes. Certainly. Yes. 

Reginald. Thats all right. Now, Edie, put on your 
veil and of¥ with you to the church. The bridegroom's 
waiting. [He sits down at the table], 

Edith. Is it understood that Slattox and Chinnery 
are liars and thieves, and that I hope by next Wednesday 
to have in my hands conclusive evidence that Slattox is 
something much worse? 

Sykes. I made no conditions as to that when I pro- 
posed to you; and now I cant go back. I hope Provi- 
dence will spare my poor mother. I say again I'm ready 
to marry you. 

Edith. Then I think you shew great weakness of 
character; and instead of taking advantage of it I shall 
set you a better example. I want to know is this true. 
[She produces a pamphlet and takes it to the Bishop; 
then sits down between Hotchkiss and her mother]. 

The Bishop [reading the title] Do you know what 

YOU ARE going TO DO? By A WOMAN WHO HAS DONE IT. 

May I ask^ my dear, what she did? 

Edith. She got married. When she had three chil- 



254 Getting Married 

dren — the eldest only four years old — her husband com- 
mitted a murder, and then attempted to commit suicide, 
but only succeeded in disfiguring himself. Instead of 
hanging him, they sent him to penal servitude for life, 
for the sake, they said, of his wife and infant children. 
And she could not get a divorce from that horrible mur- 
derer. They would not even keep him imprisoned for 
life. For twenty years she had to live singly, bringing 
up her children by her own work, and knowing that just 
when they were grown up and beginning life, this dread- 
ful creature would be let out to disgrace them all, and 
prevent the two girls getting decently married, and drive 
the son out of the country perhaps. Is that really the 
law? Am I to understand that if Cecil commits a mur- 
der, or forges, or steals, or becomes an atheist, I cant get 
divorced from him? 

The Bishop. Yes, my dear. That is so. You must 
take him for better for worse. 

Edith. Then I most certainly refuse to enter into 
any such wicked contract. What sort of servants? what 
sort of friends? what sort of Prime Ministers should we 
have if we took them for better for worse for all their 
lives? We should simply encourage them in every sort 
of wickedness. Surely my husband's conduct is of more 
importance to me than Mr Balfour's or Mr Asquith's. 
If I had known the law I would never have consented. 
I dont believe any woman would if she realized what 
she was doing. 

Sykes. But I'm not going to commit murder. 

Edith. How do you know? Ive sometimes wanted 
to murder Slattox. Have you never wanted to murder 
somebody. Uncle Rejjy? 

Reginald [ai Hotchkiss, with intense expression] 
Yes. 

Leo. Rejjy ! 

Reginald. I said yes; and I mean yes. There was 



Getting Married 255 

one night, Hotchkiss, when I jolly near shot you and 
Leo and finished up with myself; and thats the truth. 

Leo [suddenly whimpering] Oh Rejjy [she runs to 
him and kisses him ] . 

Reginald [wrathfully] Be off. [She returns weep- 
ing to her seat]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [petting Leo, but speaking to the 
company at large] But isnt all this great nonsense? 
What likelihood is there of any of us committing a 



crime r 



HoTCHKiss. Oh yes, I assure you. I went into the 
matter once very carefully; and I found things I 
have actually done — things that everybody does, I im- 
agine — would expose me, if I were found out and prose- 
cuted, to ten years' penal servitude, two years hard 
labor, and the loss of all civil rights. Not counting that 
I'm a private trustee, and, like all private trustees, a 
fraudulent one. Otherwise, the widow for whom I am 
trustee would starve occasionally, and the children get 
no education. And I'm probably as honest a man as 
any here. 

The General [outraged[ Do you imply that I have 
been guilty of conduct that would expose me to penal 
servitude } 

Hotchkiss. I should think it quite likely. But of 
course I dont know. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. But bless me ! marriage is not a 
question of law, is it? Have you children no affection 
for one another ? Surely thats enough ? 

Hotchkiss. If it's enough, why get married? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Stuff, Sin j on ! Of course people 
must get married. [Uneasily] Alfred: why dont you 
say something? Surely youre not going to let this go on. 

The General. Ive been waiting for the last twenty 
minutes, Alfred, in amazement! in stupefaction! to hear 
you put a stop to all this. We look to you: it's your 



256 Getting Married 

place, your office, your duty. Exert your authority at 
once. 

The Bishop. You must give the devil fair play, 
Boxer. Until you have heard and weighed his case you 
have no right to condemn him. I'm sorry you have been 
kept waiting twenty minutes; but I myself have waited 
twenty years for this to happen. Ive often wrestled 
with the temptation to pray that it might not happen in 
my own household. Perhaps it was a presentiment that 
it might become a part of our old Bridgenorth burden 
that made me warn our Governments so earnestly that 
unless the law of marriage were first made human, it 
could never become divine. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Oh, do be sensible about this. 
People must get married. What would you have said if 
Cecil's parents had not been married? 

The Bishop. They were not, my dear. 

Hallo ! 

What d'ye mean? 

Eh? 

Not married! 

What! 



Hotchkiss. 

Reginald. 

The General. 

Leo. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. 



Sykes [rising in amazement] What on earth do you 
mean, Bishop? My parents were married. 

Hotchkiss. You cant remember, Cecil. 

Sykes. Well, I never asked my mother to shew me 
her marriage lines, if thats what you mean. What man 
ever has? I never suspected — I never knew — Are you 
joking? Or have we all gone mad? 

The Bishop. Dont be alarmed, Cecil. Let me ex- 
plain. Your parents were not Anglicans. You were 
not, I think, Anglican yourself, until your second year at 
Oxford. They were Positivists. They went through the 
Positivist ceremony at Newton Hall in Fetter Lane after 
entering into the civil contract before the Registrar of 



Getting Married 257 

the West Strand District. I ask you, as an Anglican 
Catholic, was that a marriage? 

Sykes [overwhelmed] Great Heavens, no ! a thou- 
sand times, no. I never thought of that. I'm a child 
of sin. [He collapses into the railed chair]. 

The Bishop. Oh, come, come ! You are no more a 
child of sin than any Jew, or Mohammedan, or Noncon- 
formist, or anyone else born outside the Church. But 
you see how it affects my view of the situation. To me 
there is only one marriage that is holy: the Church's sac- 
rament of marriage. Outside that, I can recognize no 
distinction between one civil contract and another. 
There was a time when all marriages were made in 
Heaven. But because the Church was unwise and would 
not make its ordinances reasonable, its power over men 
and women was taken away from it; and marriages gave 
place to contracts at a registry office. And now that our 
Governments refuse to make these contracts reasonable, 
those whom we in our blindness drove out of the Church 
will be driven out of the registry office; and we shall 
have the history of Ancient Rome repeated. We shall be 
joined by our solicitors for seven, fourteen, or twenty- 
one years — or perhaps months. Deeds of partnership 
will replace the old vows. 

The General. Would you, a Bishop, approve of 
such partnerships ? 

The Bishop. Do you think that I, a Bishop, approve 
of the Deceased Wife's Sister Act? That did not pre- 
vent its becoming law. 

The General. But when the Government sounded 
you as to whether youd marry a man to his deceased 
wife's sister you very naturally and properly told them 
youd see them damned first. 

The Bishop [horrified] No, no, really. Boxer! You 
must not — 

The General [impatiently] Oh, of course I dont 



258 Getting Married 

mean that you used those words. But that was the 
meaning and the spirit of it. 

The Bishop. Not the spirit, Boxer, I protest. But 
never mind that. The point is that State marriage is 
already divorced from Church marriage. The relations 
between Leo and Rejjy and Sinjon are perfectly legal; 
but do you expect me, as a Bishop, to approve of them? 

The General. I dont defend Reginald. He should 
have kicked you out of the house, Mr. Hotchkiss. 

Reginald [rising] How could I kick him out of the 
house .'' He's stronger than me : he could have kicked me 
out if it came to that. He did kick me out: what else 
was it but kicking out, to take my wife's affections from 
me and establish himself in my place.'' [He comes to 
the hearth]. 

Hotchkiss. I protest, Reginald, I said all that a 
man could to prevent the smash. 

Reginald. Oh, I know you did: I dont blame you: 
people dont do these things to one another: they happen 
and they cant be helped. What was I to do? I was old: 
she was young. I was dull: he was brilliant. I had a 
face like a walnut: he had a face like a mushroom. I 
was as glad to have him in the house as she was: he 
amused me. And we were a couple of fools: he gave 
us good advice — told us what to do when we didnt know. 
She found out that I wasnt any use to her and he was; 
so she nabbed him and gave me the chuck. 

Leo. H you dont stop talking in that disgraceful 
way about our married life, I'll leave the room and never 
speak to you again. 

Reginald. Youre not going to speak to me again, 
anyhow, are you? Do you suppose I'm going to visit 
you when you marry him ? 

Hotchkiss. I hope so. Surely youre not going to be 
vindictive, Rejjy. Besides, youll have all the advan- 
tages I formerly enjoyed. Youll be the visitor, the re- 



Getting Married 259 

lief, the new face, the fresh news, the hopeless attach- 
ment: I shall only be the husband. 

Reginald \savagely\ Will you tell me this, any of 
you? how is it that we always get talking about Hotch- 
kiss when our business is about Edith? [He fumes up 
the kitchen to the tower and back to his chair]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Will somebody tell me how the 
world is to go on if nobody is to get married? 

Sykes. Will somebody tell me what an honorable 
man and a sincere Anglican is to propose to a woman 
whom he loves and who loves him and wont marry him? 

Leo. Will somebody tell me how I'm to arrange to 
take care of Rejjy when I'm married to Sinjon. Rejjy 
must not be allowed to marry anyone else, especially 
that odious nasty creature that told all those wicked lies 
about him in Court. 

HoTCHKiss. Let us draw up the first English part- 
nership deed. 

Leo. For shame, Sinjon! 

The Bishop. Somebody must begin, my dear. Ive 
a very strong suspicion that when it is drawn up it will 
be so much worse than the existing law that you will all 
prefer getting married. We shall therefore be doing 
the greatest possible service to morality by just trying 
how the new system would work. 

Lesbia [suddenly reminding them of her forgotten 
presence as she stands thoughtfully in the garden door- 
way] Ive been thinking. 

The Bishop [to Hotchkiss] Nothing like making 
people think: is there, Sinjon? 

Lesbia [coming to the table, on the General's left] 
A woman has no right to refuse motherhood. That is 
clear, after the statistics given in The Times by Mr Sid- 
ney Webb. 

The General. Mr Webb has nothing to do with it. 
It is the Voice of Nature. 



260 Getting Married 

Lesbia. But if she is an English lady it is her right 
and her duty to stand out for honorable conditions. If 
we can agree on the conditions, I am willing to enter 
into an alliance with Boxer. 

The General staggers to his feet, momentarily stupent 
and speechless. 

Edith [rising] And I with Cecil. 

Leo [rising] And I with Rejjy and St John, 

The General [aghast] An alliance! Do you mean 
a — a — a — 

Reginald. She only means bigamy, as I understand 
her. 

The General. Alfred: how long more are you 
going to stand there and countenance this lunacy.'' 
Is it a horrible dream or am I awake .^ In the name 
of common sense and sanity, let us go back to real 
life— 

Collins comes in through the tower, in alderman's 
robes. The ladies who are standing sit down hastily, and 
look as unconcerned as possible. 

Collins. Sorry to hurry you, my lord; but the 
Church has been full this hour past; and the organist 
has played all the wedding music in Lohengrin three 
times over. 

The General. The very man we want. Alfred: 
I'm not equal to this crisis. You are not equal to it. 
The Army has failed. The Church has failed. I shall 
put aside all idle social distinctions and appeal to the 
Municipality. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Do, Boxer. He is sure to get 
us out of this difficulty. 

Collins, a little puzzled, comes forward affably to 
Hotchkiss's left. 

Hotchkiss [rising, impressed by the aldermanic 
gown] Ive not had the pleasure. Will you introduce 
me? 



m 



Getting Married 261 

Collins [confidentially] All right, sir. Only the 
greengrocer, sir, in charge of the wedding breakfast. 
Mr Alderman Collins, sir, when I'm in my gown. 

HoTCHKiss [staggered] Very pleased indeed [he sits 
down again]. 

The Bishop. Personally I value the counsel of my 
old friend, Mr Alderman Collins, very highly. If Edith 
and Cecil will allow him — 

Edith. Collins has known me from my childhood: I'm 
sure he will agree with me. 

Collins. Yes, miss : you may depend on me for that. 
Might I ask what the difficulty is ? 

Edith. Simply this. Do you expect me to get mar- 
ried in the existing state of the law.'' 

Sykes [rising and coming to Collin's left elhorv] I 
put it to you as a sensible man: is it any worse for her 
than for me.-* 

Reginald [leaving his place and thrusting himself 
between Collins and Sykes, who returns to his chair] 
Thats not the point. Let this be understood, Mr Collins. 
It's not the man who is backing out: it's the woman. 
[He posts himself on the hearth]. 

Lesbia. We do not admit that, Collins. The women 
are perfectly ready to make a reasonable arrangement. 

Leo. With both men. 

The General. The case is now before you, Mr Col- 
lins. And I put it to you as one man to another : did you 
ever hear such crazy nonsense? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. The world must go on, mustnt 
it, Collins ? 

Collins [snatching at this, the first intelligible propo- 
sition he has heard] Oh, the world will go on, maam: 
dont you be afraid of that. It aint so easy to stop it as 
the earnest kind of people think. 

Edith. I knew you would agree with me, Collins. 
Thank you. 



262 Getting Married 

HoTCHKiss. Have you the least idea of what they 
are talking about, Mr Alderman? 

Collins. Oh, thats all right, sir. The particulars 
dont matter. I never read the report of a Committee: 
after all, what can they sa^' that you dont know.'' You 
pick it up as they go on talking, [i/e goes to the corner 
of the table and speaks across it to the company]. Well, 
my Lord and Miss Edith and Madam and Gentlemen, 
it's like this. Marriage is tolerable enough in its way 
if youre easygoing and dont expect too much from it. 
But it doesnt bear thinking about. The great thing is 
to get the young people tied up before they know what 
theyre letting themselves in for. Theres Miss Lesbia 
now. She waited till she started thinking about it; and 
then it was all over. If you once start arguing. Miss 
Edith and Mr Sykes, youll never get married. Go and 
get married first: youll have plenty of arguing after- 
wards, miss, believe me. 

HoTCHKiss. Your warning comes too late. Theyve 
started arguing already. 

The General. But you dont take in the full — well, 
I dont wish to exaggerate; but the only word I can find 
is the full horror of the situation. These ladies not only 
refuse our honorable offers, but as I understand it — and 
I'm sure I beg your pardon most heartily, Lesbia, if I'm 
wrong, as I hope I am — they actually call on us to enter 
into— I'm sorry to use the expression; but what can I 
say? — into alliances with them under contracts to be 
drawn up by our confounded solicitors. 

Collins. Dear me. General: thats something new 
when the parties belong to the same class. 

The Bishop. Not new, Collins. The Romans 
did it. 

Collins. Yes: they would, them Romans. When 
youre in Rome do as the Romans do, is an old saying. 
But we're not in Rome at present, my lord. 



Getting Married 263 

The Bishop. We have got into many of their ways. 
What do you think of the contract system, Collins ? 

Collins. Well, my lord, when theres a question of 
a contract, I always say, shew it to me on paper. If it's 
to be talk, let it be talk ; but if it's to be a contract, down 
with it in black and white; and then we shall know what 
we're about. 

HoTCHKiss. Quite right, Mr Alderman. Let us 
draft it at once. May I go into the study for writing 
materials. Bishop.'' 

The Bishop. Do, Sinjon. 

Hotchkiss goes into the library. 

Collins. If I might point out a difficulty, my lord — 

The Bishop. Certainly. [He goes to the fourth 
chair from the General's left, hut before sitting down, 
courteously points to the chair at the end of the table 
next the hearth]. Wont you sit down, Mr Alderman? 
[Collins, very appreciative of the Bishop's distinguished 
consideration, sits down. The Bishop then takes his 
seat], 

Collins. We are at present six men to four ladies. 
Thats not fair. 

Reginald. Not fair to the men, you mean. 

Leo. Oh! Rejjy has said something clever! Can I 
be mistaken in him.'' 

Hotchkiss comes back with a blotter and some paper. 
He takes the vacant place in the middle of the table be- 
tween Lesbia and the Bishop. 

Collins. I tell you the truth, my lord and ladies and 
gentlemen: I dont trust my judgment on this subject. 
Theres a certain lady that I always consult on delicate 
points like this. She has a very exceptional experience, 
and a wonderful temperament and instinct in affairs of 
the heart. 

Hotchkiss. Excuse me, Mr Alderman: I'm a snob; 
and I warn you that theres no use consulting anyone who 



264 Getting Married 

will not advise us frankly on class lines. Marriage is 
good enough for the lower classes : they have facilities 
for desertion that are denied to us. What is the social 
position of this lady? 

Collins. The highest in the borough, sir. She is 
the Mayoress. But you need not stand in awe of her, 
sir. She is my sister-in-law. [To the Bishop] Ive 
often spoken of her to your lady, my lord. [To Mrs 
Bridgenorth] Mrs George, maam. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [startled] Do you mean to say, 
Collins, that Mrs George is a real person? 

Collins [equally startled] Didnt you believe in her, 
maam? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Never for a moment. 

The Bishop. We always thought that Mrs George 
was too good to be true. I still dont believe in her, Col- 
lins. You must produce her if you are to convince me. 

Collins [overwhelmed] Well, I'm so taken aback by 
this that — Well I never ! ! ! Why ! shes at the church 
at this moment, waiting to see the wedding. 

The Bishop. Then produce her. [Collins shakes his 
head] . Come, Collins ! confess. Theres no such person. 

Collins. There is, my lord: there is, I assure you. 
You ask George. It's true / cant produce her; but you 
can, my lord. 

The Bishop. I ! 

Collins. Yes, my lord, you. For some reason that I 
never could make out, she has forbidden me to talk about 
you, or to let her meet you. Ive asked her to come here 
of a wedding morning to help with the flowers or the 
like; and she has always refused. But if you order her 
to come as her Bishop, she'll come. She has some very 
strange fancies, has Mrs George. Send your ring to 
her, my lord — the official ring — send it by some very 
stylish gentleman — perhaps Mr Hotchkiss here would be 
good enough to take it — and she'll come. 



Getting Married 265 

The Bishop [taking off his ring and handing it to 
Hotchkiss] Oblige me by undertaking the mission. 

HoTCHKiss. But how am I to know the lady? 

Collins. She has gone to the church in state, sir, 
and will be attended by a Beadle with a mace. He will 
point her out to you ; and he will take the front seat of 
the carriage on the way back. 

Hotchkiss. No, by heavens! Forgive me. Bishop; 
but you are asking too much. I ran away from the 
Boers because I was a snob. I run away from the 
Beadle for the same reason. I absolutely decline the 
mission. 

The General [rising impressively] Be good enough 
to give me that ring, Mr Hotchkiss. 

Hotchkiss. With pleasure. [He hands it to him]. 

The General. I shall have the great pleasure, Mr 
Alderman, in waiting on the Mayoress with the Bishop's 
orders ; and I shall be proud to return with municipal 
honors. [He stalks out gallantly, Collins rising for a 
moment to bow to him with marked dignity]. 

Reginald. Boxer is rather a fine old josser in his 
way. 

Hotchkiss. His uniform gives him an unfair ad- 
vantage. He will take all the attention off the 
Beadle. 

Collins. I think it would be as well, my lord, to go 
on with the contract while we're waiting. The truth is, 
we shall none of us have much of a look-in when Mrs 
George comes ; so we had better finish the writing part of 
the business before she arrives. 

Hotchkiss. I think I have the preliminaries down 
all right. [Reading] ' Memorandum of Agreement 
made this day of blank blank between blank blank of 
blank blank in the County of blank. Esquire, hereinafter 
called the Gentleman, of the one part, and blank blank 
of blank in the County of blank, hereinafter called the 



266 Getting Married 

Lady, of the other part, whereby it is declared and agreed 
as follows.' 

Leo [rising-] You might remember your manners, 
Sinjon. The lady comes first. [She goes behind him 
and stoops to look at the draft over his shoulder]. 

HoTCHKiss. To be sure. I beg your pardon. [He 
alters the draft^. 

Leo. And you have got only one lady and one gen- 
tleman. There ought to be two gentlemen. 

Collins. Oh, thats a mere matter of form, maam. 
Any number of ladies or gentlemen can be put in, 

Leo. Not any number of ladies. Only one lady. 
Besides, that creature wasnt a lady. 

Reginald. You shut your head, Leo. This is a gen- 
eral sort of contract for everybody: it's not your con- 
tract. 

Leo. Then what use is it to me? 

HoTCHKiss. You will get some hints from it for your 
own contract. 

Edith. I hope there will be no hinting. Let us have 
the plain straightforward truth and nothing but the 
truth. 

Collins. Yes, yes, miss : it will be all right. Theres 
nothing underhand, I assure you. It's a model agree- 
ment, as it were. 

Edith [unconvinced] I hope so. 

HoTCHKiss. What is the first clause in an agreement, 
usually? You know, Mr Alderman. 

Collins [at a loss] Well, sir, the Town Clerk always 
sees to that. Ive got out of the habit of thinking for 
myself in these little matters. Perhaps his lordship 
knows. 

The Bishop. I'm sorry to say I dont. But Soames 
will know. Alice, where is Soames? 

HoTCHKiss. He's in there [pointing to the study]. 

The Bishop [to his rvife] Coax him to join us, my 



Getting Married 267 

love. [Mrs Bridgenorth goes into the study]. Soames 
is my chaplain, Mr Collins. The great difficulty about 
Bishops in the Church of England to-day is that the af- 
fairs of the diocese make it necessary that a Bishop 
should be before everything a man of business, capable 
of sticking to his desk for sixteen hours a day. But the 
result of having Bishops of this sort is that the spiritual 
interests of the Church, and its influence on the souls 
and imaginations of the people, very soon begins to go 
rapidly to the devil — 

Edith [shocked] Papa ! 

The Bishop. I am speaking technically, not in Box- 
er's manner. Indeed the Bishops themselves went so far 
in that direction that they gained a reputation for being 
spiritually the stupidest men in the country and commer- 
cially the sharpest. I found a way out of this difficulty. 
Soames was my solicitor. I found that Soames, though a 
very capable man of business, had a romantic secret his- 
tory. His father was an eminent Nonconformist divine 
who habitually spoke of the Church of England as The 
Scarlet Woman. Soames became secretly converted to 
Anglicanism at the age of fifteen. He longed to take 
holy orders, but didnt dare to, because his father had a 
weak heart and habitually threatened to drop dead if 
anybody hurt his feelings. You may have noticed that 
people with weak hearts are the tyrants of English fam- 
ily life. So poor Soames had to become a solicitor. 
When his father died — by a curious stroke of poetic jus- 
tice he died of scarlet fever, and was found to have had 
a perfectly sound heart — I ordained Soames and made 
him my chaplain. He is now quite happy. He is a celi- 
bate; fasts strictly on Fridays and throughout Lent; 
wears a cassock and biretta ; and has more legal business 
to do than ever he had in his old office in Ely Place. 
And he sets me free for the spiritual and scholarly pur- 
suits proper to a Bishop. 



268 Getting Married 

Mrs Bridgenorth Incoming bach from the study with 
a knitting basket^ Here he is. [<S/ie resumes her seat, 
and knits] . 

Soames comes in in cassock and biretta. He salutes 
the company by blessing them rvith two fingers. 

HoTCHKiss. Take my place, Mr Soames. \^He gives 
up his chair to him, and retires to the oak chest, on which 
he seats himself^. 

The Bishop. No longer Mr Soames, Sinjon. Father 
Anthony. 

Soames [taking his seat] I was christened Oliver 
Cromwell Soames. My father had no right to do it. I 
have taken the name of Anthony. When you become 
parents, young gentlemen, be very careful not to label 
a helpless child with views which it may come to hold in 
abhorrence. 

The Bishop. Has Alice explained to you the nature 
of the document we are drafting.'' 

SoAMES. She has indeed. 

Lesbia. That sounds as if you disapproved. 

SoAMES. It is not for me to approve or disapprove. 
I do the work that comes to my hand from my ecclesias- 
tical superior. 

The Bishop. Dont be uncharitable, Anthony. You 
must give us your best advice. 

Soames. My advice to you all is to do your duty by 
taking the Christian vows of celibacy and poverty. The 
Church was founded to put an end to marriage and to 
put an end to property. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. But how could the world go on, 
Anthony ? 

Soames. Do your duty and see. Doing your duty is 
your business: keeping the world going is in higher 
hands. 

Lesbia. Anthony: youre impossible. 

Soames [taking up his pen] You wont take my ad- 



Getting Married 269 

vice. I didnt expect you would. Well, I await your 
instructions. 

Reginald. We got stuck on the first clause. What 
should we begin with.'' 

SoAMES. It is usual to begin with the term^of the 
contract. 

Edith. What does that mean.'' 

SoAMES. The term of years for which it is to hold 
good. 

Leo. But this is a marriage contract. 

SoAMEs. Is the marriage to be for a year, a week, or 
a day.'' 

Reginald. Come, I say, Anthony ! Youre worse 
than any of us. A day ! 

SoAMEs. Off the path is off the path. An inch or a 
mile: what does it matter.'* 

Leo. If the marriage is not to be for ever, I'll have 
nothing to do with it. I call it immoral to have a mar- 
riage for a term of years. If the people dont like it they 
can get divorced. 

Reginald. It ought to be for just as long as the two 
people like. Thats what I say. 

Collins. They may not agree on the point, sir. It's 
often fast with one and loose with the other. 

Lesbia. I should say for as long as the man behaves 
himself. 

The Bishop. Suppose the woman doesnt behave her- 
self.? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. The woman may have lost all 
her chances of a good marriage with anybody else. She 
should not be cast adrift. 

Reginald. So may the man ! What about his 
home ? 

Leo. The wife ought to keep an eye on him, and see 
that he is comfortable and takes care of himself properly. 
Tlie other man wont want her all the time. 



270 Getting Married 

Lesbia. There may not be another man. 

Leo. Then why on earth should she leave him? 

Lesbia. Because she wants to. 

Leo. Oh, if people are going to be let do what they 
want to, then I call it simple immorality. \^She goes 
indignantly to the oak chest, and perches herself on it 
close beside Hotchkiss]. 

Reginald [watching them sourly^ You do it your- 
self, dont you.f* 

Leo. Oh, thats quite different. Dont make foolish 
witticisms, Rejjy. 

The Bishop. We dont seem to be getting on. What 
do you say, Mr Alderman? 

Collins. Well, my lord, you see people do persist in 
talking as if marriages was all of one sort. But theres 
almost as many different sorts of marriages as theres dif- 
ferent sorts of people. Theres the young things that 
marry for love, not knowing what theyre doing, and the 
old things that marry for money and comfort and com- 
panionship. Theres the people that marry for children. 
Theres the people that dont intend to have children and 
that arnt fit to have them. Theres the people that marry 
because theyre so much run after by the other sex that 
they have to put a stop to it somehow. Theres the peo- 
ple that want to try a new experience, and the people 
that want to have done with experiences. How are you 
to please them all? Why, youll want half a dozen dif- 
ferent sorts of contract. 

The Bishop. Well, if so, let us draw them all up. 
Let us face it. 

Reginald. Why should we be held togeijier whether 
we like it or not ? Thats the question thats at the bottom 
of it all. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Because of the children, Rejjy. 

Collins. But even then, maam, why should we be 
held together when thats all over — when the girls are 



'^H 



Getting Married 271 

married and the boys out in the world and in business 
for themselves ? When thats done with^ the real work of 
the marriage is done with. If the two like to stay to- 
gether, let them stay together. But if not, let them part, 
as old people in the workhouses do. Theyve had enough 
of one another. Theyve found one another out. AVhy 
should they be tied together to sit there grudging 
and hating and spiting one another like so many do.f* 
Put it twenty years from the birth of the youngest 
child. 

SoAMES. How if there be no children.'' 

Collins. Let em take one another on liking. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Collins ! 

Leo. You wicked old man ! 

The Bishop [remonstrating] My dear, my dear! 

Lesbia. And what is a woman to live on, pray, when 
she is no longer liked, as you call it.'' 

SoAMEs [ivith sardonic formality] It is proposed that 
the term of the agreement be twenty years from the birth 
of the youngest child when there are children. Any 
amendment? 

Leo. I protest. It must be for life. It would not 
be a marriage at all if it were not for life. 

Soames. Mrs Reginald Bridgenorth proposes life. 
Any seconder? 

Leo. Dont be soulless, Anthony. 

Lesbia. I have a very important amendment. If 
there are any children, the man must be cleared com- 
pletely out of the house for two years on each occasion. 
At such times he is superfluous, importunate, and ri- 
diculous. 

Collins. But where is he to go, miss? 

Lesbia. He can go where he likes as long as he does 
not bother the mother. 

Reginald. And is she to be left lonely — 

Lesbia. Lonely ! With her child. The poor woman 



272 Getting Married 

would be only too glad to have a moment to herself. 
Dont be absurd, Rejjy. 

Reginald. That father is to be a wandering 
wretched outcast, living at his club, and seeing nobody 
but his friends' wives ! 

Lesbia [ironically] Poor fellow! 

HoTCHKiss. The friends' wives are perhaps the solu- 
tion of the problem. You see, their husbands will also 
be outcasts; and the poor ladies will occasionally pine 
for male society. 

Lesbia. There is no reason why a mother should not 
have male society. What she clearly should not have is 
a husband, 

SoAMES, Anything else. Miss Grantham? 

Lesbia. Yes: I must have my own separate house, or 
my own separate part of a house. Boxer smokes: I cant 
endure tobacco. Boxer believes that an open window 
means death from cold and exposure to the night air: I 
must have fresh air always. We can be friends; but we 
cant live together; and that must be put in the agree- 
ment. 

Edith. Ive no objection to smoking; and as to open- 
ing the windows, Cecil will of course have to do what is 
best for his health. 

The Bishop. Who is to be the judge of that, my 
dear? You or he? 

Edith. Neither of us. We must do what the doctor 
orders. 

Reginald. Doctor be — ! 

Leo [admovitorily^ Rejjy! 

Reginald [to Soames] You take my tip, Anthony. 
Put a clause into that agreement that the doctor is to 
have no say in the job. It's bad enough for the two peo- 
ple to be married to one another without their both being 
married to the doctor as well. 

Lesbia. That reminds me of something very impor- 



Getting Married 273 

tant. Boxer believes in vaccinnation : I do not. There 
must be a clause that I am to decide on such questions 
as I think best. 

Leo [to the Bishop] Baptism is nearly as important 
as vaccination : isnt it ? 

The Bishop. It used to be considered so, my dear. 

Leo. Well, Sinjon scoffs at it: he says that god- 
fathers are ridiculous. I must be allowed to decide. 

Reginald. Theyll be his children as well as yours, 
you know. 

Leo. Dont be indelicate, Rejjy. 

Edith. You are forgetting the very important matter 
of money. 

Collins. Ah ! Money ! Now we're coming to it ! 

Edith. When I'm married I shall have practically no 
money except what I shall earn. 

The Bishop. I'm sorry, Cecil. A Bishop's daughter 
is a poor man's daughter. 

Sykes. But surely you dont imagine that I'm going 
to let Edith work when we're married. I'm not a rich 
man; but Ive enough to spare her that; and when my 
mother dies — 

Edith. What nonsense! Of course I shall work 
when I'm married. I shall keep your house. 

Sykes. Oh, that ! 

Reginald. You call that work? 

Edith. Dont you.'' Leo used to do it for nothing; 
so no doubt you thought it wasnt work at all. Does your 
present housekeeper do it for nothing? 

Reginald. But it will be part of your duty as 
a wife. 

Edith. Not under this contract. I'll not have it so. 
If I'm to keep the house, I shall expect Cecil to pay me 
at least as well as he would pay a hired housekeeper. 
I'll not go begging to him every time I want a new dress 
or a cab fare, as so many women have to do. 



274 Getting Married 

Sykes. You know very well I would grudge you 
nothing, Edie. 

Edith. Then dont grudge me my self-respect and 
independence. I insist on it in fairness to you^ Cecil, 
because in this way there will be a fund belonging solely 
to me; and if Slattox takes an action against you for 
anything I say, you can pay the damages and stop the 
interest out of my salary. 

SoAMES. You forget that under this contract he will 
not be liable, because you will not be his wife in law. 

Edith. Nonsense ! Of course I shall be his wife. 

Collins [his curiosity roused] Is Slattox taking an 
action against you, miss ? Slattox is on the Council with 
me. Could I settle it? 

Edith. He has not taken an action ; but Cecil says he 
will. 

Collins. What for, miss, if I may ask.-* 

Edith. Slattox is a liar and a thief; and it is my duty 
to expose him. 

Collins. You surprise me, miss. Of course Slattox 
is in a manner of speaking a liar. If I may say so with- 
out offence, we're all liars, if it was only to spare one 
another's feelings. But I shouldnt call Slattox a thief. 
He's not all that he should be, perhaps ; but he pays his 
way. 

Edith. If that is only your nice way of saying that 
Slattox is entirely unfit to have two hundred girls in his 
power as absolute slaves, then I shall say that too about 
him at the very next public meeting I address. He steals 
their wages under pretence of fining them. He steals 
their food under pretence of buying it for them. He lies 
when he denies having done it. And he does other 
things, as you evidently know, Collins. Therefore I give 
you notice that I shall expose him before all England 
without the least regard to the consequences to myself. 

Sykes. Or to me.'' 



Getting Married 275 

Edith. I take equal risks. Suppose you felt it to 
be your duty to shoot Slattox, what would become of me 
and the children.^ I'm sure I dont want anybody to be 
shot: not even Slattox j^ but if the public never will take 
any notice of even the most crying evil until somebody 
is shot, what are people to do but shoot somebody.^ ) 

SoAMEs [inea'orabli/] I'm waiting for my instructions 
as to the term of the agreement. 

Reginald [impatiently, leaving the hearth and going 
behind Soames] It's no good talking all over the shop 
like this. We shall be here all day. I propose that the 
agreement holds good until the parties are divorced. 

SoAMES. They cant be divorced. They will not be 
married. 

Reginald, But if they cant be divorced, then this 
will be worse than marriage. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Of course it will. Do stop this 
nonsense. Why, who are the children to belong to.'' 

Lesbia. We have already settled that they are to be- 
long to the mother. 

Reginald. No: I'm dashed if you have. I'll fight 
for the ownership of my own children tooth and nail; 
and so will a good many other fellows, I can tell you. 

Edith. It seems to me that they should be divided 
between the parents. If Cecil wishes any of the children 
to be his exclusively, he should pay a certain sum for 
the risk and trouble of bringing them into the world: say 
a thousand pounds apiece. The interest on this could go 
towards the support of the child as long as we live to- 
gether. But the principal would be ray property. In 
that way, if Cecil took the child away from me, I should 
at least be paid for what it had cost me. 

Mrs Bridgenorth \putting down her knitting in 
amazement] Edith! Who ever heard of such a thing!! 

Edith. Well, how else do you propose to settle it.'' 

The Bishop. There is such a thing as a favorite 



276 Getting Married 

child. What about the youngest child — the Benjamin — 
the child of its parents' matured strength and charity, 
always better treated and better loved than the unfortu- 
nate eldest children of their youthful ignorance and wil- 
fulness? Which parent is to own the youngest child, 
payment or no payment? 

Collins. Theres a third party, my lord. Theres the 
child itself. My wife is so fond of her children that 
they cant call their lives their own. They all run 
away from home to escape from her. A child hasnt a 
grown-up person's appetite for affection. A little of 
it goes a long way with them ; and they like a good 
imitation of it better than the real thing, as every nurse 
knows. 

SoAMES. Are you sure that any of us, young or old, 
like the real thing as well as we like an artistic imitation 
of it? Is not the real thing accursed? Are not the best 
beloved alwaj^s the good actors rather than the true suf- 
ferers? Is not love always falsified in novels and plays 
to make it endurable? I have noticed in myself a great 
delight in pictures of the Saints and of Our Lady; but 
when I fall under that most terrible curse of the priest's 
lot, the curse of Joseph pursued by the wife of Potiphar, 
I am invariably repelled and terrified. 

HoTCHKiss. Are you now speaking as a saint, Father 
Anthony, or as a solicitor? 

SoAMEs. There is no difference. There is not one 
Christian rule for solicitors and another for saints. Their 
hearts are alike; and their way of salvation is along the 
same road. 

The Bishop. But " few there be that find it." Can 
you find it for us, Anthony? 

SoAMEs. It lies broad before you. It is the way to 
destruction that is narrow and tortuous. Marriage is an 
abomination which the Church was founded to cast out 
and replace by the communion of saints. I learnt that 



Getting Married 277 

from every marriage settlement I drew up as a solicitor 
no less than from inspired revelation. You have set 
yourselves here to put your sin before you in black and 
white; and you cant agree upon or endure one article 
of it. 

Sykes. It's certainly rather odd that the whole thing 
seems to fall to pieces the moment you touch it. 

The Bishop. You see, when you give the devil fair 
play he loses his case. He has not been able to produce 
even the first clause of a working agreement; so I'm 
afraid we cant wait for him any longer. 

Lesbia. Then the community will have to do without 
my children. 

Edith. And Cecil will have to do without me. 

Leo [getting off the chest] And I positively will 
not marry Sin j on if he is not clever enough to make 
some provision for my looking after Rejjy. [She leaves 
Hotchkiss, and goes back to her chair ct the end of the 
table behind Mrs Bridgenorth]. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. And the world will come to an 
end with this generation, I suppose. 

Collins. Cant nothing be done, my lord.'' 

The Bishop. You can make divorce reasonable and 
decent: that is all. 

Lesbia. Thank you for nothing. If you will only 
make marriage reasonable and decent, you can do as 
you like about divorce. I have not stated my deepest 
objection to marriage; and I dont intend to. There are 
certain rights I will not give any person over me. 

Reginald. Well, I think it jolly hard that a man 
should support his wife for years, and lose the chance 
of getting a really good wife, and then have her refuse 
to be a wife to him. 

Lesbia. I'm not going to discuss it with you, Rejjy. 
If your sense of personal honor doesnt make you under- 
stand, nothing will. 



278 Getting Married 

SoAMEs [implacably] I'm still awaiting my instruc- 
tions. 

They look at one another, each waiting for one of the 
others to suggest something. Silence. 

Reginald [blankly] I suppose, after all, marriage is 
better than — well, than the usual alternative. 

SoAMEs [turning fiercely on Imn] What right have 
you to say so? You know that the sins that are wasting 
and maddening this unhappy nation are those committed 
in wedlock. 

Collins. Well, the single ones cant afford to in- 
dulge their affections the same as married people. 

SoAMES. Away with it all, I say. You have your 
Master's commandments. Obey them. 

HoTCHKiss [rising and leaning on the back of the 
chair left vacant by the General] I really must point 
out to you, Father Anthony, that the early Christian rules 
of life were not made to last, because the early Christians 
did not believe that the world itself was going to last. 
Now we know that we shall have to go through with it. 
We have found that there are millions of years behind 
us ; and we know that that there are millions before us. 
Mrs Bridgenorth's question remains unanswered. How 
is the world to go on.'' You say that that is our business 
— that it is the business of Providence. But the 
modern Christian view is that we are here to do the 
business of Providence and nothing else. The question is, 
how. Am I not to use my reason to find out why? 
Isnt that what my reason is for? Well, all my reason 
tells me at present is that you are an impracticable 
lunatic. 

SoAMEs. Does that help? 

HOTCHKISS. No. 

SoAMES. Then pray for light. 

HoTCHKiss. No: I am a snob, not a beggar. [He 
sits down in the GeneraVs chair]. 



Getting Married 279 

Collins. We dont seem to be getting on, do we? 
Miss Edith: you and Mr Sykes had better go off to 
church and settle the right and wrong of it afterwards. 
Itll ease your minds, believe me: I speak from experi- 
ence. You will burn your boats, as one might say. 

SoAMEs. We should never burn our boats. It is 
death in life. 

Collins. Well, Father, I will say for you that you 
have views of your own and are not afraid to out with 
them. But some of us are of a more cheerful disposition. 
On the Borough Council now, you would be in a minority 
of one. You must take human nature as it is. 

SoAMES. Upon what compulsion must I? I'll take 
divine nature as it is. I'll not hold a candle to the devil. 

The Bishop. Thats a very unchristian way of treat- 
ing the devil. 

Reginald. Well, we dont seem to be getting any fur- 
ther, do we? 

The Bishop. Will you give it up and get married, 
Edith? 

Edith. No. What I propose seems to me quite rea- 
sonable. 

The Bishop. And you, Lesbia? 

Lesbia. Never. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. Never is a long word, Lesbia. 
Dont say it. 

Lesbia [with a flash of temper] Dont pity me, Alice, 
please. As I said before, I am an English lady, quite 
prepared to do without anything I cant have on hon- 
orable conditions. 

So AMES [after a silence compressive of utter deadlock] 
I am still awaiting my instructions. 

Reginald. Well, we dont seem to be getting along, 
do we? 

Leo [out of patience] You said that before, Rejjy. 
Do not repeat yourself. 



280 Getting Married 

Reginald. Oh, bother ! [He goes to the garden 
door and looks out gloomily]. 

SoAMEs [rising with the paper in his hands] Psha! 
[He tears it in pieces]. So much for the contract! 

The Voice of The Beadle. By your leave there, 
gentlemen. Make way for the Mayoress. Way for the 
worshipful the Mayoress, my lords and gentlemen. [He 
comes in through the tower, in cocJced hat and gold- 
braided overcoat, bearing the borough mace, and posts 
himself at the entrance]. By your leave, gentlemen, way 
for the worshipful the Mayoress. 

Collins [moving back towards the wall] Mrs 
George, my lord. 

Mrs George is every inch a Mayoress in point of sty- 
lish dressing; and she does it very well indeed. There 
is nothing quiet about Mrs George: she is not afraid of 
colors, and knows how to make the most of them. Not 
at all a lady in Lesbia's use of the term as a class label, 
she proclaims herself to the first glance as the triumph- 
ant, pampered, wilful, intensely alive woman who has 
always been rich among poor people. In a historical 
musetim she woidd explain Edward the Fourth's taste for 
shopkeepers' wives. Her age, which is certainly 40, and 
might be 50, is carried off by her vitality, her resilient 
figure, and her confident carriage. So far, a remarkably 
well-preserved woman. Biit her beauty is wrecked, like 
an ageless landscape ravaged by long and fierce war. 
Her eyes are alive, arresting and haunting; and there is 
still a turn of delicate beauty and pride in her indom- 
itable chin; btit her cheeks are wasted and lined, her 
mouth writhen and piteous. The whole face is a battle- 
field of the passions, quite deplorable until she speaks, 
when an alert sense of fun rejuvenates her in a moment, 
and makes her company irresistible. 

All rise except Soames, who sits down. Leo joins 
Reginald at the garden door. Mrs Bridgenorth hurries 



Gettinff Married 281 



*o 



to the tower to receive her guest, and gets as far as 
Soames's chair when Mrs George appears. Hotchkiss, 
apparently recognizing her, recoils in consternation to 
the study door at the furthest corner of the room from 
her. 

Mrs George \coming straight to the Bishop with the 
ring in her hand] Here is your ring, my lord; and here 
am I. It's your doing, remember: not mine. 

The Bishop. Good of you to come. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. How do you do, Mrs Collins.'' 

Mrs George [going to her past the Bishop, and gaz- 
ing intently at her] Are you his wife? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. The Bishop's wife? Yes. 

Mrs George. What a destiny ! And you look like 
any other woman ! 

Mrs Bridgenorth [introducing Lesbia] My sister. 
Miss Grantham. 

Mrs George. So strangely mixed up with the story 
of the General's life? 

The Bishop. You know the story of his life, then? 

Mrs George. Not all. We reached the house be- 
fore he brought it up to the present day. But enough 
to know the part played in it by Miss Grantham. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [inti-oductng Leo] Mrs Reginald 
Bridgenorth. 

Reginald. The late ]\Irs Reginald Bridgenorth. 

Leo. Hold your tongue, Rejjy. At least have the 
decency to wait until the decree is made absolute. 

Mrs George [to Leo] Well, youve more time to get 
married again than he has, havnt you? 

Mrs Bridgenorth [introducing Hotchkiss] Mr St 
John Hotchkiss. 

Hotchkiss, still far aloof by the study door, bows. 

Mrs George. What ! That ! [She makes a half 
tour of the kitchen and ends right in front of him]. 
Young man: do you remember coming into my shop and 



282 Getting Married 

telling me that my husband's coals were out of place in 
your cellar, as Nature evidently intended them for the 
roof? 

HoTCHKiss. I remember that deplorable impertinence 
with shame and confusion. You were kind enough to 
answer that Mr Collins was looking out for a clever 
young man to write advertisements, and that I could take 
the job if I liked. 

Mrs George. It's still open. [She turns to Edith], 

Mrs Bridgenorth. My daughter Edith. [She comes 
towards the study door to make the introduction], 

Mrs George. The bride ! [Looking at Edith's 
dressing-jacket] Youre not going to get married like 
that, are you? 

The Bishop [coming round the table to Edith's left] 
Thats just what we are discussing. Will you be so good 
as to join us and allow us the benefit of your wisdom 
and experience? 

Mrs George. Do you want the Beadle as well? 
He's a married man. 

They all turn involuntarily and contemplate the 
Beadle, who sustains their gaze with dignity. 

The Bishop. We think there are already too many 
men to be quite fair to the women. 

Mrs George. Right, my lord. [She goes hack to 
the tower and addresses the Beadle] Take away that 
bauble, Joseph. Wait for me wherever you find yourself 
most comfortable in the neighborhood. [The Beadle 
withdraws. She notices Collins for the first time]. 
Hullo, Bill: youve got em all on too. Go and hunt up a 
drink for Joseph: theres a dear. [Collins goes out. She 
looks at Soames's cassock and biretta] What! Another 
uniform! Are you the sexton? [He rises]. 

The Bishop. My chaplain, Father Anthony. 

Mrs George. Oh Lord! [To Soames, coaxingly] 
You dont mind, do you? 



Getting Married 283 

SoAMES. I mind nothing but my duties. 

The Bishop. You know everybody now, I think. 

Mrs George [turning to the railed chair] Who's this? 

The Bishop. Oh, I beg your pardon, Cecil. Mr 
Sykes. The bridegroom. 

Mrs George [to Sykes] Adorned for the sacrifice, 
arnt you .^ 

Sykes. It seems doubtful whether there is going to 
be any sacrifice. 

Mrs George. Well, I want to talk to the women 
first. Shall we go upstairs and look at the presents and 
dresses ^ 

Mrs Bridgenorth. If you wish, certainly, 

Reginald. But the men want to hear what you have 
to say too. 

Mrs George. I'll talk to them afterwards: one by 
one. 

Hotchkiss [to himself] Great heavens! 

Mrs Bridgenorth. This way, Mrs Collins. [She 
leads the way out through the tower, followed by Mrs 
George, Lesbia, Leo, and Edith]. 

The Bishop. Shall we try to get through the last 
batch of letters whilst they are away, Soames? 

SoAMES. Yes, certainly. [To Hotchkiss, mho is in 
his way] Excuse me. 

The Bishop and Soames go into the study, disturbing 
Hotchkiss, who, plunged in a strange reverie, has for- 
gotten where he is. Awakened by Soames, he stares dis- 
tractedly; then, with sudden resolution, goes swiftly to 
the middle of the kitchen. 

Hotchkiss. Cecil. Rejjy. [Startled by his urgency, 
they hurry to him]. I'm frightfully sorry to desert on 
this day; but I must bolt. This time it really is pure 
cowardice. I cant help it. 

Reginald. What are you afraid of? 

Hotchkiss. I dont know. Listen to me. I was a 



284 Getting Married 

young fool living by myself in London. I ordered my 
first ton of coals from that woman's husband. At that 
time I did not know that it is not true economy to buy 
the lowest priced article: I thought all coals were alike, 
and tried the thirteen shilling kind because it seemed 
cheap. It proved unexpectedly inferior to the family 
Silkstone ; and in the irritation into which the first scuttle 
threw me, I called at the shop and made an idiot of 
myself as she described. 

Sykes. Well, suppose you did ! Laugh at it, man. 

HoTCHKiss. At that, yes. But there was something 
worse. Judge of my horror when, calling on the coal 
merchant to make a trifling complaint at finding my 
grate acting as a battery of quick-firing guns, and being 
confronted by his vulgar wife, I felt in her presence an 
extraordinary sensation of unrest, of emotion, of unsat- 
isfied need. I'll not disgust you with details of the mad- 
ness and folly that followed that meeting. But it went 
as far as this: that I actually found myself prowling 
past the shop at night under a sort of desperate neces- 
sity to be near some place where she had been. A hide- 
ous temptation to kiss the doorstep because her foot had 
pressed it made me realize how mad I was. I tore my- 
self away from London by a supreme effort ; but I was 
on the point of returning like a needle to the lodestone 
when the outbreak of the war saved me. On the field of 
battle the infatuation wore off. The Billiter affair made 
a new man of me: I felt that I had left the follies and 
puerilities of the old days behind me for ever. But half- 
an-hour ago — when the Bishop sent off that ring — a sud- 
den grip at the base of my heart filled me with a name- 
less terror — me, the fearless ! I recognized its cause 
when she walked into the room. Cecil: this woman is a 
harpy, a siren, a mermaid, a vampire. There is only 
one chance for me: flight, instant precipitate flight. 
Make my excuses. Forget me. Farewell. [He makes 



Getting Married 285 

for the door and is confronted by Mrs George entering]. 
Too late: I'm lost. [He turns back and throws himself 
desperately into the chair nearest the study door: that 
being the furthest away from her]. 

Mrs George [coming to the hearth and addressing 
Reginald] Mr Bridgenorth: will you oblige me by leav- 
ing me with this young man. I want to talk to him like 
a mother, on your business. 

Reginald. Do, maam. He needs it badly. Come 
along, Sykes. [He goes into the study]. 

Sykes [looks irresolutely at Hotchkiss] — ? 

HoTCHKiss. Too late: you cant save me now, Cecil. 
Go. 

Sykes goes into the study. Mrs George strolls across 
to Hotchkiss and contemplates him curiously. 

Hotchkiss. Useless to prolong this agony. [Ris- 
ing] Fatal woman — if woman you are indeed and not a 
fiend in human form — 

Mrs George. Is this out of a book.'* Or is it your 
usual society small talk? 

Hotchkiss [recklessly] Jibes are useless: the force 
that is sweeping me away will not spare you. I must 
know the worst at once. What was your father.'' 

Mrs George. A licensed victualler who married his 
barmaid. You would call him a publican, most likely. 

Hotchkiss. Then you are a woman totally beneath 
me. Do you deny it.^ Do you set up any sort of pre- 
tence to be my equal in rank, in age, or in culture.'' 

Mrs George. Have you eaten anything that has dis- 
agreed with you.'' 

Hotchkiss [witheringly] Inferior! 

Mrs George. Thank you. Anything else? 

Hotchkiss. This. I love you. My intentions are 
not honorable. [She shows no dismay]. Scream. Ring 
the bell. Have me turned out of the house. 

Mrs George [with sudden depth of feeling] Oh, if 



286 Getting Married 

you could restore to this wasted exhausted heart one ray 
of the passion that once welled up at the glance — at the 
touch of a lover ! It's you who would scream then, young 
man. Do you see this face, once fresh and rosy like your 
own, now scarred and riven by a hundred burnt-out 
fires ? 

HoTCHKiss [wildly] Slate fires. Thirteen shillings a 
ton. Fires that shoot out destructive meteors, blinding 
and burning, sending men into the streets to make fools 
of themselves. 

Mrs George. You seem to have got it pretty bad. 
Sin j on. 

HoTCHKiss. Dont dare call me Sinjon. 

Mrs George. My name is Zenobia Alexandrina. You 
may call me Polly for short. 

HoTCHKiss. Your name is Ashtoreth — Durga — there 
is no name yet invented malign enough for you. 

Mrs George [sitting down comfortably] Come! Do 
you really think youre better suited to that young sauce- 
box than her husband? You enjoyed her company when 
you were only the friend of the family — when there was 
the husband there to shew off against and to take all the 
responsibility. Are you sure youll enjoy it as much 
when you are the husband.'' She isnt clever, you know. 
She's only silly-clever. 

HoTCHKiss [uneasily leaning against the table and 
holding on to it to control his nervous movements] Need 
you tell me ? fiend that you are ! 

Mrs George. You amused the husband, didnt you? 

HoTCHKiss. He has more real sense of humor than 
she. He's better bred. That was not my fault. 

Mrs George. My husband has a sense of humor 
too. 

HoTCHKiss. The coal merchant? — I mean the slate 
merchant. 

Mrs George [appreciatively] He would just love to 



Getting Married 287 

hear you talk. He's been dull lately for want of a change 
of company and a bit of fresh fun. 

HoTCHKiss [flinging a chair opposite her and sitting 
down with an overdone attempt at studied insolence^ 
And pray what is your wretched husband's vulgar con- 
viviality to me? 

Mrs George. You love me? 

HoTCHKiss. I loathe you. 

Mrs George. It's the same thing. 

HoTCHKiss. Then I'm lost. 

Mrs George. You may come and see me if you 
promise to amuse George. 

HoTCHKiss. I'll insult him, sneer at him, wipe my 
boots on him. 

Mrs George. No you wont, dear boy. Youll be a 
perfect gentleman. 

HoTCHKiss [beaten: appealing to her mercy] Zeno- 
bia — 

Mrs George. Polly, please. 

HoTCHKiss. Mrs Collins — 

Mrs George. Sir? 

HoTCHKiss. Something stronger than my reason and 
common sense is holding my hands and tearing me along. 
I make no attempt to deny that it can drag me where 
you please and make me do what you like. But at least 
let me know your soul as you seem to know mine. Do 
you love this absurd coal merchant? 

Mrs George. Call him George. 

HoTCHKiss. Do you love your Jorjy Porjy? 

Mrs George. Oh, I dont know that I love him. He's 
my husband, you know. But if I got anxious about 
George's health, and I thought it would nourish him, I 
would fry a^ou with onions for his breakfast and think 
nothing of it. George and I are good friends. George 
belongs to me. Other men may come and go; but George 
goes on for ever. 



288 Getting Married 

HoTCHKiss. Yes: a husband soon becomes nothing 
but a habit. Listen: I suppose this detestable fascina- 
tion you have for me is love. 

Mrs George. Any sort of feeling for a woman is 
called love nowadays. 

HoTCHKiss. Do you love me? 

Mrs George [promptly] My love is not quite so 
cheap an article as that, my lad. I wouldnt cross the 
street to have another look at you — not yet. I'm not 
starving for love like the robins in winter, as the good 
ladies youre accustomed to are. Youll have to be very 
clever, and very good, and very real, if you are to inter- 
est me. If George takes a fancy to you, and you amuse 
him enough, I'll just tolerate you coming in and out oc- 
casionally for — well, say a month. If you can make a 
friend of me in that time so much the better for you. 
If you can touch my poor dying heart even for an in- 
stant, I'll bless you, and never forget you. You may try 
— if George takes to you. 

HoTCHKiss. I'm to come on liking for the month .^ 

Mrs George. On condition that you drop Mrs Reg- 
inald. 

HoTCHKiss. But she wont drop me. Do you suppose 
I ever wanted to marry her .'' I was a homeless bachelor ; 
and I felt quite happy at their house as their friend. 
Leo was an amusing little devil; but I liked Reginald 
much more than I liked her. She didnt understand. 
One day she came to me and told me that the inevitable 
had happened. I had tact enough not to ask her what 
the inevitable was ; and I gathered presently that she had 
told Reginald that their marriage was a mistake and that 
she loved me and could no longer see me breaking my 
heart for her in suffering silence. What could I say? 
What could I do ? What can I say now ? What can I do 
now? 

Mrs George. Tell her that the habit of falling in 



Getting Married 289 

love with other men's wives is growing on you; and that 
I'm your latest. 

HoTCHKiss. What! Throw her over when she has 
thrown Reginald over for me ! 

Mrs George [rising] You wont then? Very well. 
Sorry we shant meet again: I should have liked to see 
more of you for George's sake. Good-bye [she moves 
away from hivi towards the hearth^. 

HoTCHKiss [appealing^ Zenobia — 

Mrs. George. I thought I had made a difficult con- 
quest. Now I see you are only one of those poor petti- 
coat-hunting creatures that any woman can pick up. Not 
for me, thank you. [Inexorable, she turns towards the 
tower to go\. 

HoTCHKiss [following^ Dont be an ass, Polly. 

Mrs George [stopping^ Thats better. 

HoTCHKiss. Cant you see that I maynt throw Leo 
over just because I should be only too glad to. It would 
be dishonorable. 

Mrs George. Will you be happy if you marry her.'' 

HoTCHKiss. No, great heaven, NO ! 

Mrs George. Will she be happy when she finds you 
out.^ 

HoTCHKiss. She's incapable of happiness. But she's 
not incapable of the pleasure of holding a man against 
his will. 

Mrs George. Right, young man. You will tell her, 
please, that you love me: before everybody, mind, the 
very next time you see her. 

HOTCHKISS. But — 

Mrs George. Those are my orders, Sin j on. I cant 
have you marry another woman until George is tired of 
you. 

HoTCHKiss. Oh, if I only didnt selfishly want to 
obey you ! 

The General comes in from the garden. Mrs George 



290 Getting Married 

goes half way to the garden door to speak to him. 
Hotchkiss posts himself on the hearth. 

Mrs George. Where have you been all this time? 

The General. I'm afraid my nerves were a little 
upset by our conversation. I just went into the garden 
and had a smoke. I'm all right now [he strolls down to 
the study door and presently takes a chair at that end of 
the big table^. 

Mrs George. A smoke! Why, you said she couldnt 
bear it. 

The General. Good heavens ! I forgot ! It's such 
a natural thing to do, somehow. 

Lesbia comes in through the tower. 

Mrs George. He's been smoking again. 

Lesbia. So my nose tells me. [She goes to the end 
of the table nearest the hearth, and sits down]. 

The General. Lesbia; I'm very sorry. But if I 
gave it up, I should become so melancholy and irritable 
that you would be the first to implore me to take to it 
again. 

Mrs George. Thats true. Women drive their hus- 
bands into all sorts of wickedness to keep them in good 
humor. Sinjon: be off with you: this doesnt concern 
you. 

Lesbia. Please dont disturb yourself, Sinjon. Box- 
er's broken heart has been worn on his sleeve too long 
for any pretence of privacy. 

The General. You are cruel, Lesbia: devilishly 
cruel. [He sits down, wounded]. 

Lesbia. You are vulgar. Boxer. 

Hotchkiss. In what way? I ask, as an expert in 
vulgarity. 

Lesbia. In two ways. First, he talks as if the only 
thing of any importance in life was which particu- 
lar woman he shall marry. Second, he has no self- 
control. 



Getting Married 291 

The General. Women are not all the same to me, 
Lesbia. 

Mrs George. Why should they be, praj} Women 
are all different: it's the men who are all the same. Be- 
sides, what does Miss Grantham know about either men 
or women.'' She's got too much self-control. 

Lesbia [widejiing her eyes and lifting her chin haugh- 
tily] And pray how does that prevent me from knowing 
as much about men and women as people who have no 
self-control ? 

Mrs George. Because it frightens people into behav- 
ing themselves before you; and then how can you tell 
what they really are } Look at me ! I was a spoilt 
child. My brothers and sisters were well brought up, 
like all children of respectable publicans. So should I 
have been if I hadnt been the youngest: ten years 
younger than my youngest brother. My parents were 
tired of doing their duty by their children by that time; 
and they spoilt me for all they were worth. I never knew 
what it was to want money or anything that money could 
buy. When I wanted my own way, I had nothing to do 
but scream for it till I got it. When I was annoyed 7 
didnt control myself: I scratched and called names. Did 
you ever, after you were grown up, pull a grown-up 
woman's hair.'' Did you ever bite a grown-up man? 
Did you ever call both of them every name you could 
lay your tongue to ? 

Lesbia [shivering rvith disgust] No. 

Mrs George. Well, I did. I know what a woman is 
like when her hair's pulled. I know what a man is like 
when he's bit. I know what theyre both like when you 
tell them what you really feel about them. And thats how 
I know more of the world than you. 

Lesbia. The Chinese know what a man is like when 
he is cut into a thousand pieces, or boiled in oil. That 
sort of knowledge is of no use to me. I'm afraid we 



292 Getting Married 

shall never get on with one another, Mrs George. I live 
like a fencer, always on guard. I like to be confronted 
with people who are always on guard. I hate sloppy 
people, slovenly people, people who cant sit up straight, 
sentimental people, 

Mrs George. Oh, sentimental your grandmother ! 
You dont learn to hold your own in the world by stand- 
ing on guard, but by attacking, and getting well ham- 
mered yourself. 

Lesbia. I'm not a prize-fighter, Mrs. Collins. If I 
cant get a thing without the indignity of fighting for 
it, I do without it. 

Mrs George. Do you? Does it strike you that if 
we were all as clever as you at doing without, there 
wouldnt be much to live for, would there? 

The General. I'm afraid, Lesbia, the things you 
do without are the things you dont want. 

Lesbia [surprised at his wit] Thats not bad for the 
silly soldier man. Yes, Boxer: the truth is, I dont want 
you enough to make the very unreasonable sacrifices re- 
quired by marriage. And yet that is exactly why I 
ought to be married. Just because I have the qualities 
my country wants most I shall go barren to my grave; 
whilst the women who have neither the strength to resist 
marriage nor the intelligence to understand its infinite 
dishonor will make the England of the future. [She 
rises and walks towards the study]. 

The General [as she is about to pass him] Well, I 
shall not ask you again, Lesbia. 

Lesbia. Thank you. Boxer. [She passes on to the 
study door], 

Mrs George. Youre quite done with him, are 
you? 

Lesbia. As far as marriage is concerned, yes. The 
field is clear for you, Mrs George. [She goes into the 
study]. 



Getting Married 293 

The General buries his face in his hands. Mrs George 
comes round the table to him. 

Mrs George ^sympathetically^ She's a nice woman, 
that. And a sort of beauty about her too, different from 
anyone else. 

The General [overwhelmed] Oh Mrs Collins, thank 
you, thank you a thousand times. [He rises effusively^. 
You have thawed the long-frozen springs [he kisses her 
hand]. Forgive me; and thank you: bless you — [he again 
takes refuge in the garden, choked with emotion]. 

Mrs George [looking after him triumphantly^ Just 
caught the dear old warrior on the bounce, eh? 

HoTCHKiss. Unfaithful to me already ! 

Mrs George. I'm not your property, young man: 
dont you think it. [She goes over to him and faces him]. 
You understand that.'' [He suddenly snatches her into 
his arms and kisses her^. Oh! You dare do that again, 
you young blackguard; and I'll jab one of these chairs in 
your face [she seizes one and holds it in readiness'\. 
Now you shall not see me for another month. 

HoTCHKiss [deliberately] I shall pay my first visit 
to your husband this afternoon. 

Mrs George. Youll see what he'll say to you when I 
tell him what youve just done. 

HoTCHKiss. What can he say.^ What dare he say? 

Mrs George. Suppose he kicks you out of the house ? 

HoTCHKiss. How can he? Ive fought seven duels 
with sabres. Ive muscles of iron. Nothing hurts me: 
not even broken bones. Fighting is absolutely uninter- 
esting to me because it doesnt frighten me or amuse me ; 
and I always win. Your husband is in all these respects 
an average man, probably. He will be horribly afraid 
of me; and if under the stimulus of your presence, and 
for your sake, and because it is the right thing to do 
among vulgar people, he were to attack me, I should sim- 
ply defeat him and humiliate him [he gradually gets his 



294 Getting Married 

hands on the chair and takes it from her, as his words 
go home phrase by phrase]. Sooner than expose him 
to that, you would suffer a thousand stolen kisses, 
wouldnt you? 

Mrs George [in utter consternation] You young 
viper ! 

HoTCHKiss. Ha ha ! You are in my power. That is 
one of the oversights of your code of honor for husbands : 
the man who can bully them can insult their wives with 
impunity. Tell him if you dare. If I choose to take 
ten kisses, how will you prevent me.'' 

Mrs George. You come within reach of me and I'll 
not leave a hair on your head. 

HoTCHKiss [catching her tvrists dexterously] Ive got 
your hands. 

Mrs George. Youve not got my teeth. Let go; or 
I'll bite. I will, I tell you. Let go. 

HoTCHKiss. Bite away: I shall taste quite as nice 
as George. 

Mrs George. You beast. Let me go. Do you call 
yourself a gentleman, to use your brute strength against 
a woman? 

HoTCHKiss. You are stronger than me in every way 
but this. Do you think I will give up my one advantage ? 
Promise youll receive me when I call this afternoon. 

Mrs George. After what youve just done? Not if it 
was to save my life. 

HoTCHKiss. I'll amuse George. 

Mrs George. He wont be in. 

HoTCHKiss [takeii aback] Do you mean that we 
should be alone? 

Mrs George [snatching away her hands triumphantly 
as his grasp relaxes] Aha! Thats cooled you, has it? 

HoTCHKiss [anxiously] When will George be at 
home ? 

Mrs George. It wont matter to you whether he's at 



Getting Married 295 

home or not. The door will be slammed in your face 
whenever you call. 

HoTCHKiss. No servant in London is strong enough 
to close a door that I mean to keep open. You cant es- 
cape me. If you persist, I'll go into the coal trade; 
make George's acquaintance on the coal exchange; and 
coax him to take me home with him to make your ac- 
quaintance. 

Mrs George. We have no use for you, young man: 
neither George nor I [she sails away from him and sits 
down at the end of the table near the study door], 

HoTCHKiss [following her and taking the next chair 
round the corner of the table^ Yes you have. George 
cant fight for you: I can. 

Mrs George [turning to face him] You bully. You 
low bully. 

HoTCHKiss. You have courage and fascination: I 
have courage and a pair of fists. We're both bullies, 
Polly. 

Mrs George. You have a mischievous tongue. Thats 
enough to keep you out of my house. 

HoTCHKiss. It must be rather a house of cards. A 
word from me to George — just the right word, said in 
the right way — and down comes your house. 

Mrs George. Thats why I'll die sooner than let you 
into it. 

HoTCHKiss. Then as surely as you live, I enter the 
coal trade to-morrow. George's taste for amusing com- 
pany will deliver him into my hands. Before a month 
passes your home will be at my mercy. 

Mrs George [rising, at bay] Do you think I'll let 
myself be driven into a trap like this ? 

HoTCHKiss. You are in it already. Marriage is a 
trap. You are married. Any man who has the power 
to spoil your marriage has the power to spoil your life. 
I have that power over you. 



296 Getting Married 

Mrs George [desperate] You mean it? 

HoTCHKiss. I do. 

Mrs George [resolutely] Well, spoil my marriage 
and be — 

HoTCHKiss [springing up^ Polly! 

Mrs George. Sooner than be your slave I'd face 
any unhappiness. 

HoTCHKiss. What! Even for George? 

Mrs George. There must be honor between me 
and George, happiness or no happiness. Do your 
worst. 

HoTCHKiss [admiring her] Are you really game, 
Polly? Dare you defy me? 

Mrs George. If you ask me another question I shant 
be able to keep my hands off you [she dashes distract- 
edly past him to the other end of the table, her fingers 
crisping] . 

HoTCHKiss. That settles it. Polly: I adore you: we 
were born for one another. As I happen to be a gentle- 
man, I'll never do anything to annoy or injure you ex- 
cept that I reserve the right to give you a black eye if 
you bite me; but youll never get rid of me now to the 
end of your life. 

Mrs George. I shall get rid of you if the beadle has 
to brain you with the mace for it [she makes for the 
tower], 

HoTCHKiss [rtinning between the table and the oak 
chest and across to the tower to cut her off] You shant. 

Mrs George [panting] Shant I though? 

HoTCHKiss. No you shant. I have one card left to 
play that youve forgotten. Why were you so unlike 
yourself when you spoke to the Bishop? 

Mrs George [agitated beyond measure] Stop. Not 
that. You shall respect that if you respect nothing else. 
I forbid you. [He kneels at her feet]. What are you 
doing? Get up: dont be a fool. 



Getting Married 297 

HoTCHKiss. Polly: I ask you on my knees to let me 
make George's acquaintance in his home this afternoon ; 
and I shall remain on my knees till the Bishop comes in 
and sees us. What will he think of you then ? 

Mrs George [beside herself] Wheres the poker? 

She rushes to the fireplace; seises the poker; and 
makes for Hotchkiss, who flies to the study door. The 
Bishop enters just then and finds himself betrveen them, 
narrowly escaping a blow from the poker. 

The Bishop. Dont hit him, Mrs Collins. He is my 
guest. 

Mrs George throws down the poker; collapses into the 
nearest chair; and hursts into tears. The Bishop goes 
to her and pats her consolingly on the shoulder. She 
shudders all through at his touch. 

The Bishop. Come ! you are in the house of your 
friends. Can we help you.'' 

Mrs George [to Hotchkiss, pointing to the study] 
Go in there, you. Youre not wanted here. 

Hotchkiss. You understand, Bishop, that Mrs Col- 
lins is not to blame for this scene. I'm afraid Ive been 
rather irritating. 

The Bishop. I can quite believe it, Sinjon. 

Hotchkiss goes into the study. 

The Bishop [turning to Mrs George with great kind- 
ness of manner] I'm sorry you have been worried [he 
sits down on her left]. Never mind him. A little pluck, 
a little gaiety of heart, a little prayer; and youll be 
laughing at him. 

Mrs George. Never fear. I have all that. It was 
as much my fault as his; and I should have put him in 
his place with a clip of that poker on the side of his head 
if you hadnt come in. 

The Bishop. You might have put him in his coffin 
that way, Mrs Collins. And I should have been very 
sorry; because we are all fond of Sinjon. 



298 Getting Married 

Mrs George. Yes: it's your duty to rebuke me. But 
do you think I dont know? 

The Bishop. I dont rebuke you. Who am I that I 
should rebuke you.^ Besides, I know there are discus- 
sions in which the poker is the only possible argument. 

Mrs George. My lord: be earnest with me. I'm a 
very funny woman, I daresay; but I come from the same 
workshop as you. I heard you say that yourself years 
ago. 

The Bishop. Quite so; but then I'm a very funny 
Bishop. Since we are both funny people, let us not for- 
get that humor is a divine attribute. 

Mrs George. I know nothing about divine attributes 
or whatever you call them ; but I can feel when I am 
being belittled. It was from you that I learnt first to 
respect myself. It was through you that I came to be 
able to walk safely through many wild and wilful paths. 
Dont go back on your own teaching. 

The Bishop. I'm not a teacher: only a fellow-trav- 
eller of whom you asked the way. I pointed ahead 
— ahead of myself as well as of you. 

Mrs George [rising and standing over him almost 
threateningly} As I'm a living woman this day, if I find 
you out to be a fraud, I'll kill myself. 

The Bishop. What ! Kill yourself for finding out 
something ! For becoming a wiser and therefore a better 
woman ! What a bad reason ! 

Mrs George. I have sometimes thought of killing 
you, and then killing myself. 

The Bishop. Why on earth should you kill yourself 
— not to mention me? 

Mrs George. So that we might keep our assignation 
in Heaven. 

The Bishop [rising and facing her, breathless] Mrs. 
Collins! You are Incognita Appassionata ! 

Mrs George. You read my letters, then? [With a 



Getting Married 299 

sigh of grateful relief, she sits down quietly, and says^ 
Thank you. 

The Bishop [remorsefully^ And I have broken the 
spell by making you come here [sitting down again]. 
Can you ever forgive me? 

Mrs George. You couldnt know that it was only the 
coal merchant's wife, could you.'' 

The Bishop. Why do you say only the coal mer- 
chant's wife.'' 

Mrs George. Many people would laugh at it. 

The Bishop. Poor people ! It's so hard to know the 
right place to laugh, isnt it? 

Mrs George. I didnt mean to make you think the 
letters were from a fine lady. I wrote on cheap paper ; 
and I never could spell. 

The Bishop. Neither could I. So that told me 
nothing. 

Mrs George. One thing I should like you to know. 

The Bishop. Yes? 

Mrs George. We didnt cheat your friend. They 
were as good as we could do at thirteen shillings a ton. 

The Bishop. Thats important. Thank you for tell- 
ing me. 

Mrs George. I have something else to say; but will 
you please ask somebody to come and stay here while we 
talk? [He rises and turns to the study door]. Not a 
woman, if you dont mind. [He nods under standingly 
and passes on]. Not a man either. 

The Bishop [stopping] Not a man and not a 
woman! We have no children left, Mrs Collins. They 
are all grown up and married. 

Mrs George. That other clergyman would do. 

The Bishop. What! The sexton? 

Mrs George. Yes. He didnt mind my calling him 
that, did he? It was only my ignorance. 

The Bishop. Not at all. [He opens the study door 



300 Getting Married 

and calls\ Soames ! Anthony! \To Mrs George^ Call 
him Father: he likes it. Y^oames appears at the study 
door^^. Mrs Collins wishes you to join us, Anthony. 

Soames looks puzzled. 

Mrs George. You dont mind, Dad, do you? \As 
this greeting visibly gives him a shock that hardly hears 
out the Bishop's advice, she says anxiously^ That was 
what you told me to call him, wasnt it? 

Soames. I am called Father Anthony, Mrs Collins. 
But it does not matter what you call me. [i/e comes in, 
and walks past her to the hearth^. 

The Bishop. Mrs Collins has something to say to 
me that she wants you to hear. 

Soames. I am listening. 

The Bishop \^going hack to his seat next her] Now. 

Mrs George. My lord: you should never have mar- 
ried. 

Soames. This woman is inspired. Listen to her, my 
lord. 

The Bishop [taken ahack by the directness of the at- 
tack] I married because I was so much in love with 
Alice that all the difficulties and doubts and dangers of 
marriage seemed to me the merest moonshine. 

Mrs George. Yes: it's mean to let poor things in 
for so much while theyre in that state. Would you 
marry now that you know better if you were a wid- 
ower? 

The Bishop. I'm old now. It wouldnt matter. 

Mrs George. But would you if it did matter? 

The Bishop. I think I should marry again lest any- 
one should imagine I had found marriage unhappy with 
Alice. 

Soames [sternly] Are you fonder of your wife than 
of your salvation? 

The Bishop. Oh, very much. When you meet a man 
who is very particular about his salvation, look out for a 



Getting Married 301 

woman who is very particular about her character; and 
marry them to one another: theyll make a perfect pair. 
I advise you to fall in love, Anthony. 

SoAMEs [with horror] I!! 

The Bishop. Yes, you ! think of what it would do 
for you. For her sake you would come to care un- 
selfishly and diligently for money instead of being 
selfishly and lazily indifferent to it. For her sake you 
would come to care in the same way for preferment. For 
her sake you would come to care for your health, your 
appearance, the good opinion of your fellow creatures, 
and all the really important things that make men work 
and strive instead of mooning and nursing their sal- 
vation. 

SoAMES. In one word, for the sake of one deadly sin I 
should come to care for all the others. 

The Bishop. Saint Anthony! Tempt him, Mrs 
Collins : tempt him. 

Mrs George [rising and looking strangely before 
her] Take care, my lord: you still have the power to 
make me obey your commands. And do you, Mr Sexton, 
beware of an empty heart. 

The Bishop. Yes. Nature abhors a vacuum, An- 
thony. I would not dare go about with an empty heart: 
why, the first girl I met would fly into it by mere at- 
mospheric pressure. Alice keeps them out now. Mrs 
Collins knows. 

Mrs George [a faint convulsion passing like a wave 
over her] I know more than either of you. One of you 
has not yet exhausted his first love: the other has not yet 
reached it. But I — I — [^she reels and is again con- 
vulsed]. 

The Bishop [saving her from falling] Whats the 
matter? Are you ill, Mrs Collins.^ [He gets her back 
into her chair] . Soames : theres a glass of water in the 
study — quick. [Soames hurries to the study door]. 



302 Getting Married 

Mrs George. No. [Soames stops], Dont call. 
Dont bring anyone. Cant you hear anything? 

The Bishop. Nothing unusual. [He sits by her, 
watching her with intense surprise and interest]. 

Mrs George. No music.'' 

Soames. No. [He steals to the end of the table and 
sits on her right, equally interested], 

Mrs George. Do you see nothing — not a great light? 

The Bishop. We are still walking in darkness. 

Mrs George. Put your hand on my forehead: the 
hand with the ring. [He does so. Her eyes close]. 

Soames [inspired to prophesy] There was a certain 
woman, the wife of a coal merchant, which had been a 
great sinner — 

The Bishop, startled, takes his hand away. Mrs 
George's eyes open vividly as she int-errupts Soames. 

Mrs George. You prophesy falsely, Anthony: never 
in all my life have I done anything that was not or- 
dained for me. [More quietly] Ive been myself. Ive 
not been afraid of myself. And at last I have escaped 
from myself, and am become a voice for them that are 
afraid to speak, and a cry for the hearts that break in 
silence. 

Soames [whispering] Is she inspired? 

The Bishop. Marvellous. Hush. 

Mrs George. I have earned the right to speak. I 
have dared : I have gone through : I have not fallen with- 
ered in the fire: I have come at last out beyond, to the 
back of Godspeed? 

The Bishop. And what do you see there, at the back 
of Godspeed? 

Soames [hungrily] Give us your message. 

Mrs George [tvith intensely sad reproach] When 
you loved me I gave you the whole sun and stars to play 
with. I gave you eternity in a single moment, strength 
of the mountains in one clasp of your arms, and the vol- 



Getting Married 303 

ume of all the seas in one impulse of your souls. A mo- 
ment only; but was it not enough? Were you not paid 
then for all the rest of your struggle on earth? Must 
I mend your clothes and sweep your floors as well ? Was 
it not enough? I paid the price without bargaining: I 
bore the children without flinching: was that a reason 
for heaping fresh burdens on me? I carried the child 
in my arms: must I carry the father too? When I 
opened the gates of paradise, were you blind? was it 
nothing to you? When all the stars sang in your ears 
and all the winds swept you into the heart of heaven, 
were you deaf? were you dull? was I no more to you 
than a bone to a dog? Was it not enough? We spent 
eternity together; and you ask me for a little lifetime 
more. We possessed all the universe together; and you 
ask me to give you my scanty wages as well. I have 
given you the greatest of all things; and you ask me 
to give you little things. I gave you your own soul: 
you ask me for my body as a plaything. Was it not 
enough? Was it not enough? 

SoAMES. Do you understand this, my lord? 

The Bishop. I have that advantage over you, An- 
thony, thanks to Alice. [He takes Mrs George's hand]. 
Your hand is very cold. Can you come down to earth? 
Do you remember who I am, and who you are? 

Mrs George. It was enough for me. I did not ask 
to meet you — to touch you — [the Bishop quickly releases 
her hand]. When you spoke to my soul years ago from 
your pulpit, you opened the doors of my salvation to me ; 
and now they stand open for ever. It was enough: I 
have asked you for nothing since : I ask you for nothing 
now. I have lived: it is enough. I have had ray wages; 
and I am ready for my work. I thank you and bless you 
and leave you. You are happier in that than I am; for 
when I do for men what you did for me, I have no 
thanks, and no blessing: I am their prey; and there is 



304 Getting Married 

no rest from their loving and no mercy from their 
loathing. 

The Bishop. You must take us as we are, Mrs 
CoUins. 

SoAMEs. No. Take us as we are capable of be- 
coming. 

Mrs George. Take me as I am: I ask no more. 
[She turns her head to the study door and cries] Yes: 
come in, come in. 

Hotchkiss comes softly in from the study. 

HoTCHKiss. Will you be so kind as to tell me whether 
I am dreaming? In there I have heard Mrs Collins say- 
ing the strangest things, and not a syllable from you 
two. 

SoAMES. My lord; is this possession by the devil? 

The Bishop. Or the ecstasy of a saint? 

HoTCHKiss. Or the convulsion of the pythoness on 
the tripod? 

The Bishop. May not the three be one? 

Mrs George [troubled] You are paining and tiring 
me with idle questions. You are dragging me back to 
myself. You are tormenting me with your evil dreams 
of saints and devils and — what was it.^" — [striving to 
fathom it] the pythoness — the pythoness — [giving it i 
up] I dont understand. I am a woman: a human crea- • 
ture like yourselves. Will you not take me as I am? 

SoAMES. Yes; but shall we take you and burn you? ^ 

The Bishop. Or take you and canonize you? I 

Hotchkiss [gaily] Or take you as a matter of course? 
[Swiftly to the Bishop] We must get her out of this: 
it's dangerous. [Aloud to her] May I suggest that 
you shall be Anthony's devil and the Bishop's saint 
and my adored Polly? [Slipping behind her, he picks 
up her hand from her lap and kisses it over her 
shoulder] . 

Mrs George [making] What was that? Who kissed 



Getting Married 305 



*» 



my hand? [To the Bishop, eagerly] Was it you? [He 
shakes his head. She is mortified]. I beg your 
pardon. 

The Bishop. Not at all. I'm not repudiating that 
honor. Allow me [he kisses her hand]. 

Mrs George. Thank you for that. It was not the 
sexton^ was it? 

SOAMES. I ! 

HoTCHKiss. It was I, Polly, your ever faithful. 

Mrs George [turning and seeing him] Let me catch 
you doing it again: thats all. How do you come there? 
I sent you away. [With great energy, becoming quite 
herself again] What the goodness gracious has been 
happening? 

HoTCHKiss. As far as I can make out, you have been 
having a very charming and eloquent sort of fit. 

Mrs George [delighted] What! My second sight! 
[To the Bishop] Oh, how I have prayed that it might 
come to me if ever I met you ! And now it has come. 
How stunning! You may believe every word I said: I 
cant remember it now; but it was something that was just 
bursting to be said; and so it laid hold of me and said 
itself. Thats how it is, you see. 

Edith and Cecil Sykes come in through the tower. 
She has her hat on. Leo follows. They have evidently 
been out together. Sykes, with an unnatural air, half 
foolish, half rakish, as if he had lost all his self-respect 
and were determined not to let it prey on his spirits, 
throws himself into a chair at the end of the table near 
the hearth and thrusts his hands into his pockets, like 
Hogarth's Rake, without waiting for Edith to sit down. 
She sits in the railed chair. Leo' takes the chair nearest 
the tower on the long side of the table, brooding, with 
closed lips. 

The Bishop. Have you been out, my dear? 

Edith. Yes. 



306 Getting Married 

The Bishop. With Cecil? 

Edith. Yes. 

The Bishop. Have you come to an understanding? 

No reply. Blank silence. 

Sykes. You had better tell them, Edie. 

Edith. Tell them yourself. 

The General comes in from the garden. 

The General ^coming forward to the tahle^ Can 
anybody oblige me with some tobacco? Ive finished 
mine; and my nerves are still far from settled. 

The Bishop. Wait a moment. Boxer. Cecil has 
something important to tell us. 

Sykes. Weve done it. Thats all. 

HoTCHKiss. Done what, Cecil? 

Sykes. Well, what do you suppose? 

Edith. Got married, of course. 

The General. Married! Who gave you away? 

Sykes \^jerking his head towards the tower] This 
gentleman did. [Seeing that they do not understand, he 
looks round and sees that there is no one there]. Oh! I 
thought he came in with us. Hes gone downstairs, I 
suppose. The Beadle. 

The General. The Beadle ! What the devil did he 
do that for? 

Sykes. Oh, I dont know: I didnt make any bargain 
with him. [To Mrs George] How much ought I to give 
him, Mrs Collins? 

Mrs George. Five shillings. [To the Bishop] I 
want to rest for a moment : there ! in your study. I saw 
it here [she touches her forehead]. 

The Bishop [opening the study door for her] By all 
means. Turn my brother out if he disturbs you. 
Soames: bring the letters out here. 

Sykes. He wont be offended at my offering it, will 
he? 

Mrs George. Not he ! He touches children with the 



Getting Married 307 

mace to cure them of ringworm for fourpence apiece. 
[She goes into the study. Soames follows her]. 

The General. Well, Edith, I'm a little disap- 
pointed, I must say. However, I'm glad it was done by- 
somebody in a public uniform. 

Mrs Bridgenorth and Lesbia come in through the 
tower. Mrs Bridgenorth makes for the Bishop. He 
goes to her, and they meet near the oak chest. Lesbia 
comes between Sykes and Edith. 

The Bishop. Alice, my love, theyre married. 

Mrs Bridgenorth [placidly] Oh, well, thats all 
right. Better tell Collins. 

Soames comes back from the study with his writing 
materials. He seats himself at the nearest end of the 
table and goes on with his work. Hotchkiss sits down 
in the next chair round the table corner, with his back 
to him. 

Lesbia. You have both given in, have you? 

Edith. Not at all. We have provided for every- 
thing. 

Soames. How? 

Edith. Before going to the church, we went to the 
office of that insurance company — whats its name, 
Cecil? 

Sykes. The British Family Insurance Corporation. 
It insures you against poor relations and all sorts of 
family contingencies. 

Edith. It has consented to insure Cecil against libel 
actions brought against him on my account. It will give 
us specially low terms because I am a Bishop's daughter. 

Sykes. And I have given Edie my solemn word that 
if I ever commit a crime I'll knock her down before a 
witness and go off to Brighton with another lady. 

Lesbia. Thats what you call providing for every- 
thing! [She goes to the middle of the table on the gar- 
den side and sits down]. 



308 Getting Married 

Leo. Do make him see there are no worms before he 
knocks you down, Edith. Wheres Rejjy.'' 

Reginald [coming in from the study] Here. Whats 
the matter.'' 

Leo [springing up and flouncing round to Aim] 
Whats the matter ! You may well ask. While Edie and 
Cecil were at the insurance office I took a taxy and went 
off to your lodgings ; and a nice mess I found everything 
in. Your clothes are in a disgraceful state. Your liver- 
pad has been made into a kettle-holder. Youre no more 
fit to be left to yourself than a one-year old baby. 

Reginald. Oh, I cant be bothered looking after 
things like that. I'm all right. 

Leo. Youre not: youre a disgrace. You never con- 
sider that youre a disgrace to me: you think only of 
yourself. You must come home with me and be taken 
proper care of: my conscience will not allow me to let 
you live like a pig. [She arranges his necktie]. You 
must stay with me until I marry St John; and then we 
can adopt you or something. 

Reginald [breaking loose from her and stumping off 
past Hotchkiss towards the hearth] No, I'm dashed if 
I'll be adopted by St John. You can adopt him if you 
like. 

Hotchkiss [ming] I suggest that that would really 
be the better plan, Leo. Ive a confession to make to you. 
I'm not the man you took me for. Your objection to 
Rejjy was that he had low tastes. 

Reginald [turning] Was it ? by George ! 

Leo. I said slovenly habits. I never thought he had 
really low tastes until I saw that woman in court. How 
he could have chosen such a creature and let her write 
to him after — 

Reginald. Is this fair? I never — 

Hotchkiss. Of course you didnt, Rejjy. Dont be 
silly, Leo. It's I who really have low tastes. 



Getting Married 309 

Leo. You ! 

HoTCHKiss. Ive fallen in love with a coal merchant's 
wife. I adore her. I would rather have one of her 
boot-laces than a lock of your hair. [He folds his arms 
and stands like a rock]. 

Reginald. You damned scoundrel^ how dare you 
throw my wife over like that before my face.'' [He 
seems on the point of assaulting Hotchkiss when Leo 
gets between them and draws Reginald away towards the 
study door]. 

Leo. Dont take any notice of him, Rejjy. Go at 
once and get that odious decree demolished or annulled 
or whatever it is. Tell Sir Gorell Barnes that I have 
changed my mind. [To Hotchkiss] I might have 
known that you were too clever to be really a gentleman. 
[She takes Reginald away to the oak chest and seats 
him there. He chuckles. Hotchkiss resumes his seat, 
brooding] . 

The Bishop. All the problems appear to be solving 
themselves. 

Lesbia. Except mine. 

The General. But, my dear Lesbia, you see what 
has happened here to-day. [Coming a little nearer and 
bending his face towards hers] Now I put it to you, 
does it not shew you the folly of not marrying? 

Lesbia. No: I cant say it does. And [rising] you 
have been smoking again. 

The General. You drive me to it, Lesbia. I cant 
help it. 

Lesbia [standing behind her chair with her hands on 
the back of it and looking radiant] Well, I wont scold 
you to-day. I feel in particularly good humor just 
now. 

The General. May I ask why, Lesbia? 

Lesbia [drawing a large breath] To think that after 
all the dangers of the morning I am still unmarried ! still 



310 • Getting Married 

independent! still my own mistress! still a glorious 
strong-minded old maid of old England! 

Soames silently springs up and makes a long stretch 
from his end of the table to shake her hand across it. 

The General. Do you find any real happiness in 
being your own mistress? Would it not be more gen- 
erous — would you not be happier as some one else's mis- 
tress — 

Lesbia. Boxer ! 

The General [^rising, horrified] No, no, you must 
know, my dear Lesbia, that I was not using the word in 
its improper sense. I am sometimes unfortunate in my 
choice of expressions ; but you know what I mean. I 
feel sure you would be happier as my wife. 

Lesbia. I daresay I should, in a frowsy sort of 
way. But I prefer my dignity and my independence. 
I'm afraid I think this rage for happiness rather 
vulgar. 

The General. Oh, very well, Lesbia. I shall not 
ask you again. [He sits down huffily]. 

Lesbia. You will. Boxer; but it will be no use. [She 
also sits down again and puts her hand almost affec- 
tionately on his]. Some day I hope to make a friend of 
you; and then we shall get on very nicely. 

The General [starting up again] Ha! I think you 
are hard, Lesbia. I shall make a fool of myself if I re- 
main here. Alice: I shall go into the garden for a 
while. 

Collins [appearing in the tower] I think everything 
is in order now, maam. 

The General [going to him] Oh, by the way, could 
you oblige me — [the rest of the sentence is lost in a 
whisper] . 

Collins. Certainly, General. [He takes out a to- 
bacco pouch and hands it to the General, who takes it 
and goes into the garden]. 



Getting Married 311 

Lesbia. I dont believe theres a man in England who 
really and truly loves his wife as much as he loves his 
pipe. 

The Bishop. By the way, what has happened to the 
wedding party? 

Sykes. I dont know. There wasnt a soul in the 
church when we were married except the pew opener 
and the curate who did the job. 

Edith. They had all gone home. 

Mrs Bridgenorth. But the bridesmaids? 

Collins. Me and the beadle have been all over the 
place in a couple of taxies, maam; and weve collected 
them all. They were a good deal disappointed on ac- 
count of their dresses, and thought it rather irregu- 
lar; but theyve agreed to come to the breakfast. 
The truth is, theyre wild with curiosity to know how 
it all happened. The organist held on until the or- 
gan was nigh worn out, and himself worse than the 
organ. He asked me particularly to tell you, my lord, 
that he held back Mendelssohn till the very last; but 
when that was gone he thought he might as well go 
too. So he played God Save The King and cleared 
out the church. He's coming to the breakfast to ex- 
plain. 

Leo. Please remember, Collins, that there is no truth 
whatever in the rumor that I am separated from my hus- 
band, or that there is, or ever has been, anything between 
me and Mr Hotchkiss. 

Collins. Bless you, maam ! one could always see 
that. [To Mrs Bridgenorth] Will you receive here or 
in the hall, maam? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. In the hall. Alfred: you and 
Boxer must go there and be ready to keep the first ar- 
rivals talking till we come. We have to dress Edith. 
Come, Lesbia: come, Leo: we must all help. Now, 
Edith. [Lesbia, Leo, and Edith go out through the 



312 Getting Married 

tower]. Collins: we shall want you when Miss Edith's 
dressed to look over her veil and things and see that 
theyre all right. 

Collins. Yes, maam. Anything you would like 
mentioned about Miss Lesbia, maam? 

Mrs Bridgenorth. No. She wont have the Gen- 
eral. I think you may take that as final. 

Collins. What a pity, maam! A fine lady wasted, 
maam. [They shake their heads sadly; and Mrs Bridge- 
north goes out through the tower]. 

The Bishop. I'm going to the hall, Collins, to re- 
ceive. Rejjy: go and tell Boxer; and come both of you 
to help with the small talk. Come, Cecil. [He goes out 
through the tower, followed by Sykes]. 

Reginald [to Hotchkiss] Youve always talked a 
precious lot about behaving like a gentleman. Well, if 
you think youve behaved like a gentleman to Leo, youre 
mistaken. And I shall have to take her part, remember 
that. 

Hotchkiss. I understand. Your doors are closed 
to me. 

Reginald [quickly] Oh no. Dont be hasty. I think 
I should like you to drop in after a while, you know. 
She gets so cross and upset when theres nobody to liven 
up the house a bit. 

Hotchkiss. I'll do my best. 

Reginald [^relieved] Righto. You dont mind, old 
chap, do you? 

Hotchkiss. It's Fate. Ive touched coal; and my 
hands are black; but theyre clean. So long, Rejjy. 
[They shake hands; and Reginald goes into the garden 
to collect Boxer]. 

Collins. Excuse me, sir; but do you stay to break- 
fast? Your name is on one of the covers; and I should 
like to change it if youre not remaining. 

Hotchkiss. How do I know? Is my destiny any 



Getting Married 313 

longer in my own hands ? Go : ask she who must be 

OBEYED. 

Collins lawestruck] Has Mrs George taken a fancy 
to you^ sir? 

HoTCHKiss. Would she had! Worse, man, worse: 
Ive taken a fancy to Mrs George. 

Collins. Dont despair, sir: if George likes your 
conversation youll find their house a very pleasant one: 
livelier than Mr Reginald's was, I daresay. 

HoTCHKiss [calling] Polly. 

Collins [promptly] Oh, if it's come to Polly already, 
sir, I should say you were all right. 

Mrs George appears at the door of the study. 

HoTCHKiss. Your brother-in-law wishes to know 
whether I'm to stay for the wedding breakfast. Tell 
him. 

Mrs George. He stays, Bill, if he chooses to behave 
himself. 

HoTCHKiss [to Collins] May I, as a friend of the 
family, have the privilege of calling you Bill ? 

Collins. With pleasure, sir, I'm sure, sir. 

HoTCHKiss. My own pet name in the bosom of my 
family is Sonny. 

Mrs George. Why didnt you tell me that before? 
Sonny is just the name I wanted for you. [She pats his 
cheek familiarly : he rises abruptly and goes to the 
hearth, where he throws himself moodily into the ruled 
chair] Bill: I'm not going into the hall until there are 
enough people there to make a proper little court for me. 
Send the Beadle for me when you think it looks good 
enough. 

Collins. Right, maam. [He goes out through the 
tower]. 

Mrs George left alone with Hotchkiss and Soames, 
suddenly puis her hands on Soames's shoulders and 
bends over him. 



314 Getting Married 

Mrs George. The Bishop said I was to tempt you, 
Anthony. 

SoAMEs l^without looking r02ind] Woman: go away. 
Mrs George. Anthony: 

" When other lips and other hearts 
Their tale of love shall tell 
HoTCHKiss [sardonically] 

In language whose excess imparts 
The power they feel so well. 
Mrs George. 

Though hollow hearts may wear a mask 
Twould break your own to see. 
In such a moment I but ask 
That youll remember me." 
And you will, Anthony. I shall put my spell on you. 

Soames. Do you think that a man who has sung the 
Magnificat and adored the Queen of Heaven has any 
ears for such trash as that or any eyes for such trash as 
you — saving your poor little soul's presence. Go home 
to your duties, woman. 

Mrs George [highly approving his fortitude] An- 
thony : I adopt you as my father. Thats the talk ! Give 
me a man whose whole life doesnt hang on some scrubby 
woman in the next street; and I'll never let him go [she 
slaps him heartily on the back]. 

Soames. Thats enough. You have another man to 
talk to. I'm busy. 

Mrs George [leaving Soames and going a step or two 
nearer Hotchkiss] Why arnt you like him. Sonny? 
Why do you hang on to a scrubby woman in the next 
street ? 

HoTCHKiss [thoughtfully] I must apologize to 
Billiter. 

Mrs George. Who is Billiter? 

Hotchkiss. A man who eats rice pudding with a 
spoon. Ive been eating rice pudding with a spoon ever 



Getting Married 315 

since I saw you first. [He rises]. We all eat our rice 
pudding with a spoon, dont we, Soames? 

SoAMES. We are members of one another. There is 
no need to refer to me. In the first place, I'm busy: in 
the second, youll find it all in the Church Catechism, 
which contains most of the new discoveries with which 
the age is bursting. Of course you should apologize to 
Billiter. He is your equal. He will go to the same 
heaven if he behaves himself and to the same hell if he 
doesnt. 

Mrs George [^sitting down] And so will my husband 
the coal merchant. 

HoTCHKiss. If I were your husband's superior here 
I should be his superior in heaven or hell: equality lies 
deeper than that. The coal merchant and I are in love 
with the same woman. That settles the question for me 
for ever. [He prowls across the kitchen to the garden 
door, deep in thought]. 

SoAMES. Psha ! 

Mrs George. You dont believe in women, do you, 
Anthony? He might as well say that he and George 
both like fried fish. 

HoTCHKiss. I do not like fried fish. Dont be low, 
Polly. 

SoAMES. Woman : do not presume to accuse me of un- 
belief. And do you, Hotchkiss, not despise this woman's 
soul because she speaks of fried fish. Some of the vic- 
tims of the Miraculous Draught of Fishes were fried. 
And I eat fried fish every Friday and like it. You are 
as ingrained a snob as ever. 

Hotchkiss [impatiently] My dear Anthony: I find 
you merely ridiculous as a preacher, because you keep 
referring me to places and documents and alleged occur- 
rences in which, as a matter of fact, I dont believe. I 
dont believe in anything but my own will and my own 
pride and honor. Your fishes and your catechisms and 



316 Getting Married 

all the rest of it make a charming poem which you call 
your faith. It fits you to perfection; but it doesnt fit 
me. I happen, like Napoleon, to prefer Mohammedanism. 
[Mrs George, associating Moham7nedanism with polyg- 
amy, looks at him with quick suspicion]. I believe the 
whole British Empire will adopt a reformed Moham- 
medanism before the end of the century. The character 
of Mahomet is congenial to me. I admire him, and share 
his views of life to a considerable extent. That beats you, 
you see, Soames. Religion is a great force — the only real 
motive force in the world ; but what you fellows dont un- 
derstand is that you must get at a man through his own 
religion and not through yours. Instead of facing that 
fact, you persist in trying to convert all men to your 
own little sect, so that you can use it against them after- 
wards. You are all missionaries and proselytizers trying 
to uproot the native religion from your neighbor's flower- 
beds and plant your own in its place. You would rather 
let a child perish in ignorance than have it taught by a 
rival sectary. You can talk to me of the quintessential 
equality of coal merchants and British officers ; and yet 
you cant see the quintessential equality of all the re- 
ligions. Who are you, anyhow, that you should know 
better than Mahomet or Confucius or any of the other 
Johnnies who have been on this job since the world 
existed .'^ 

Mrs George [admiring his eloquence] George will 
like you. Sonny. You should hear him talking about the 
Church. 

Soames. Very well, then: go to your doom, both of 
you. There is only one religion for me: that which my 
soul knows to be true; but even irreligion has one tenet; 
and that is the sacredness of marriage. You two are 
on the verge of deadly sin. Do you deny that? 

HoTCHKiss. You forget, Anthony: the marriage it- 
self is the deadly sin according to you. 



4 



Getting Married 317 

SoAMES. The question is not now what I believe, but 
what you believe. Take the vows with me; and give up 
that woman if you have the strength and the light. But 
if you are still in the grip of this world, at least respect 
its institutions. Do you believe in marriage or do you 
not.> 

HoTCHKiss. My soul is utterly free from any such 
superstition. I solemnly declare that between this 
woman, as you impolitely call her, and me, I see no bar- 
rier that my conscience bids me respect. I loathe the 
whole marriage morality of the middle classes with all 
my instincts. If I were an eighteenth century marquis 
I could feel no more free with regard to a Parisian cit- 
izen's wife than I do with regard to Polly. ; I despise all 
this domestic purity business as the lowest depth of nar- 
row, selfish, sensual, wife-grabbing vulgarity. 

Mrs George [rising promptly] Oh, indeed. Then 
youre not coming home with me, young man. I'm sorry; 
for its refreshing to have met once in my life a man who 
wasnt frightened by my wedding ring; but I'm looking 
out for a friend and not for a French marquis ; so youre 
not coming home with me. 

HoTCHKiss [inea;orably] Yes, I am. 

Mrs George. No. 

HoTCHKiss. Yes. Think again. You know your set 
pretty well, I suppose, your petty tradesmen's set. You 
know all its scandals and hypocrisies, its jealousies and 
squabbles, its hundred of divorce cases that never come 
into court, as well as its tens that do. 

Mrs George. We're not angels. I know a few scan- 
dals ; but most of us are too dull to be anything but 
good. 

HoTCHKiss. Then you must have noticed that just 
as all murderers, judging by their edifying remarks on 
the scaffold, seem to be devout Christians, so all liber- 
tines, both male and female, are invariably people over- 



318 Getting Married 

flowing with domestic sentimentality and professions of 
respect for the conventions they violate in secret. 

Mrs George. Well, you dont expect them to give 
themselves away, do you? 

HoTCHKiss. They are people of sentiment, not of 
honor. Now, I'm not a man of sentiment, but a man of 
honor. I know well what will happen to me when once 
I cross the threshold of your husband's house and break 
bread with him. This marriage bond which I despise 
will bind me as it never seems to bind the people who 
believe in it, and whose chief amusement it is to go to 
the theatres where it is laughed at. Soames: youre a 
Communist, arnt you.^ 

SoAMEs. I am a Christian. That obliges me to be a 
Communist. 

HoTCHKiss. And you believe that many of our landed 
estates were stolen from the Church by Henry the 
eighth .'' 

SoAMEs. I do not merely believe that: I know it 
as a lawyer. 

HoTCHKiss. Would you steal a turnip from one of 
the landlords of those stolen lands? 

SoAMEs [fencing -with the question] They have no 
right to their lands. 

HoTCHKiss. Thats not what I ask you. Would you 
steal a turnip from one of the fields they have no 
right to? 

SoAMES. I do not like turnips. 

HoTCHKiss. As you are a lawyer, answer me. 

Soames. I admit that I should probably not do so, 
I should perhaps be wrong not to steal the turnip: I 
cant defend my reluctance to do so; but I think I should 
not do so. I know I should not do so. 

HoTCHKiss. Neither shall I be able to steal George's 
wife. I have stretched out my hand for that forbidden 
fruit before ; and I know that my hand will always come 



Getting Married 319 



•to 



back empty. To disbelieve in marriage is easy: to love 
a married woman is easy; but to betray a comrade, to 
be disloyal to a host, to break the covenant of bread and 
salt, is impossible. You may take me home with you, 
Polly: you have nothing to fear. 

Mrs George. And nothing to hope ? 

HoTCHKiss. Since you put it in that more than kind 
way, Polly, absolutely nothing. 

Mrs George. Hm! Like most men, you think you 
know everything a woman wants, dont you? But the 
thing one wants most has nothing to do with marriage at 
all. Perhaps Anthony here has a glimmering of it. Eh, 
Anthony ? 

SoAMES. Christian fellowship? 

Mrs George. You call it that, do you? 

SoAMEs. What do you call it? 

Collins [appearing in the tower with the Beadle]- 
Now, Polly, the hall's full; and theyre waiting for you. 

The Beadle. Make way there, gentlemen, please. 
Way for the worshipful the Mayoress. If you please, 
my lords and gentlemen. By your leave, ladies and gen- 
tlemen : way for the Mayoress. 

Mrs George takes Hotchkiss's arm, and goes out, pre- 
ceded by the Beadle. 

Soames resumes his writing tranquilly. 



THE SHEWING-UP OF 
BLANCO POSNET 

XVIII 
1909 



321 



1 



PiREFACE 

The Censorship 

This little play is really a religious tract in dramatic 
form. If our silly censorship would permit its perform- 
ance, it might possibly help to set right-side-up the per- 
verted conscience and re-invigorate the starved self-re- 
spect of our considerable class of loose-lived playgoers 
whose point of honor is to deride all official and conven- 
tional sermons. As it is, it only gives me an opportunity 
of telling the story of the Select Committee of both 
Houses of Parliament which sat last year to enquire into 
the working of the censorship, against which it was 
alleged by myself and others that as its imbecility and 
mischievousness could not be fully illustrated within the 
limits of decorum imposed on the press, it could only be 
dealt with by a parliamentary body subject to no such 
limits. 

A Readable Bluebook 

Few books of the year 1909 can have been cheaper 
and more entertaining than the report of this Committee. 
Its full title is Report from the Joint Select Com- 
mittee OF THE House of Lords and the House of 
Commons on the Stage Plays (Censorship) together 
AviTH THE Proceedings of the Committee, Minutes 
of Evidence, and Appendices. What the phrase " the 
Stage Plays " means in this title I do not know; nor 
does anyone else. The number of the Bluebook is 214. 

323 



324 The Shemng-Up of Blanco Posnet 

How interesting- it is may be judged from the fact that 
it contains verbatim reports of long and animated in- 
terviews between the Committee and such witnesses as 
W. William Archer, Mr. Granville Barker, Mr. J. M. 
Barrie, Mr. Forbes Robertson, Mr. Cecil Raleigh, Mr. 
John Galsworthy, Mr. Laurence Housman, Sir Herbert 
Beerbohm Tree, Mr. W. L. Courtney, Sir William Gil- 
bert, Mr. A. B. Walkley, Miss Lena Ashwell, Professor 
Gilbert Murray, Mr. George Alexander, Mr. George Ed- 
wardes, Mr. Comyns Carr, the Speaker of the House of 
Commons, the Bishop of Southwark, Mr. Hall Caine, 
Mr. Israel Zangwill, Sir Squire Bancroft, Sir Arthur 
Pinero, and Mr. Gilbert Chesterton, not to mention my- 
self and a number of gentlemen less well known to the 
general public, but important in the world of the theatre. 
The publication of a book by so many famous contribu- 
tors would be beyond the means of any commercial pub- 
lishing firm. His Majesty's Stationery Office sells it to 
all comers by weight at the very reasonable price of three- 
and-threepence a copy. 

How Not to Do It 

It was pointed out by Charles Dickens in Little Dor- 
rit, which remains the most accurate and penetrating 
study of the genteel littleness of our class governments 
in the English language, that whenever an abuse be- 
comes oppressive enough to persuade our party parlia- 
mentarians that something must be done, they immedi- 
ately set to work to face the situation and discover 
How Not To Do It. Since Dickens's day the exposures 
effected by the Socialists have so shattered the self-sat- 
isfaction of modern commercial civilization that it is no 
longer difficult to convince our governments that some- 
thing must be done, even to the extent of attempts at a 
reconstruction of civilization on a thoroughly uncommer- 



Preface 325 

cial basis. Consequently, the first part of the process 
described by Dickens: that in which the reformers were 
snubbed by front bench demonstrations that the admin- 
istrative departments were consuming miles of red tape 
in the correctest forms of activity, and that everything 
was for the best in the best of all possible worlds, is out 
of fashion; and we are in that other phase, familiarized 
by the history of the French Revolution, in which the 
primary assumption is that the country is in danger, and 
that the first duty of all parties, politicians, and govern- 
ments is to save it. But as the effect of this is to give 
governments a great many more things to do, it also 
gives a powerful stimulus to the art of How Not To Do 
Them: that is to say, the art of contriving methods of 
reform which will leave matters exactly as they are. 

The report of the Joint Select Committee is a capital 
illustration of this tendency. The case against the cen- 
sorship was overwhelming; and the defence was more 
damaging to it than no defence at all could have been. 
Even had this not been so, the mere caprice of opinion 
had turned against the institution ; and a reform was ex- 
pected, evidence or no evidence. Therefore the Commit- 
tee was unanimous as to the necessity of reforming the 
censorship; only, unfortunately, the majority attached to 
this unanimity the usual condition that nothing should be 
done to disturb the existing state of things. How this 
was effected may be gathered from the recommendations 
finally agreed on, which are as follows. 

1. The drama is to be set entirely free by the aboli- 
tion of the existing obligation to procure a licence from 
the Censor before performing a play; but every theatre 
lease is in future to be construed as if it contained a 
clause giving the landlord power to break it and evict 
the lessee if he produces a play without first obtaining 
the usual licence from the Lord Chamberlain. 

2. Some of the plays licensed by the Lord Chamber- 



326 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

lain are so vicious that their present practical immunity 
from prosecution must be put an end to; but no manager 
who procures the Lord Chamberlain's licence for a play 
can be punished in any way for producing it, though a 
special tribunal may order him to discontinue the per- 
formance; and even this order must not be recorded to 
his disadvantage on the licence of his theatre, nor may it 
be given as a judicial reason for cancelling that licence. 

3. Authors and managers producing plays without 
first obtaining the usual licence from the Lord Chamber- 
lain shall be perfectly free to do so, and shall be at no 
disadvantage compared to those who follow the existing 
practice, except that they may be punished, have the 
licences of their theatres endorsed and cancelled, and 
have the performance stopped pending the proceedings 
without compensation in the event of the proceedings 
ending in their acquittal. 

4. Authors are to be rescued from their present sub- 
jection to an irresponsible secret tribunal which can con- 
demn their plays without giving reasons, by the substi- 
tution for that tribunal of a Committee of the Privy 
Council, which is to be the final authority on the fitness 
of a play for representation; and this Committee is to 
sit in camera if and when it pleases. 

5. The power to impose a veto on the production of 
plays is to be abolished because it may hinder the growth 
of a great national drama; but the Office of Examiner 
of Plays shall be continued; and the Lord Chamberlain 
shall retain his present powers to license plays, but shall 
be made responsible to Parliament to the extent of mak- 
ing it possible to ask questions there concerning his 
proceedings, especially now that members have discov- 
ered a method of doing this indirectly. 

And so on, and so forth. The thing is to be done; 
and it is not to be done. Everything is to be changed 
and nothing is to be changed. The problem is to be 



Preface 327 

faced and the solution to be shirked. And the word of 
Dickens is to be justified. 

The Story of the Joint Select 
Committee 

Let me now tell the story of the Committee in greater 
detail, partly as a contribution to history; partly be- 
cause, like most true stories, it is more amusing than the 
official story. 

All commissions of public enquiry are more or less in- 
timidated both by the interests on which they have to 
sit in judgment and, when their members are party poli- 
ticians, by the votes at the back of those interests; but 
this unfortunate Committee sat under a quite exceptional 
cross fire. First, there was the king. The Censor is a 
member of his household retinue; and as a king's retinue 
has to be jealously guarded to avoid curtailment of the 
royal state no matter what may be the function of the 
particular retainer threatened, nothing but an express 
royal intimation to the contrary, which is a constitutional 
impossibility, could have relieved the Committee from 
the fear of displeasing the king by any proposal to abol- 
ish the censorship of the Lord Chamberlain. Now all 
the lords on the Committee and some of the commoners 
could have been wiped out of society (in their sense of 
the word) by the slightest intimation that the king would 
prefer not to meet them; and this was a heavy risk to 
run on the chance of " a great and serious national 
drama " ensuing on the removal of the Lord Chamber- 
lain's veto on Mrs Warren's Profession. Second, there 
was the Nonconformist conscience, holding the Liberal 
Government responsible for the Committee it had ap- 
pointed, and holding also, to the extent of votes enough 
to turn the scale in some constituencies, that the theatre 
is the gate of hell, to be tolerated, as vice is tolerated. 



328 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

only because the power to suppress it could not be given 
to any public body without too serious an interference 
with certain Liberal traditions of liberty which are still 
useful to Noncomformists in other directions. Third, 
there was the commercial interest of the theatrical man- 
agers and their syndicates of backers in the City, to 
whom, as I shall shew later on, the censorship affords a 
cheap insurance of enormous value. Fourth, there was 
the powerful interest of the trade in intoxicating liquors, 
fiercely determined to resist any extension of the author- 
ity of teetotaller-led local governing bodies over theatres. 
Fifth, there were the playwrights, without political 
power, but with a very close natural monopoly of a tal- 
ent not only for play-writing but for satirical polemics. 
And since every interest has its opposition, all these 
influences had created hostile bodies by the operation of 
the mere impulse to contradict them, always strong in 
English human nature. 

Why the Managers Love the 

Censorship 

The only one of these influences which seems to be 
generally misunderstood is that of the managers. It has 
been assumed repeatedly that managers and authors are 
affected in the same way by the censorship. When a 
prominent author protests against the censorship, his 
opinion is supposed to be balanced by that of some 
prominent manager who declares that the censorship is 
the mainstay of the theatre, and his relations with the 
Lord Chamberlain and the Examiner of Plays a cher- 
ished privilege and an inexhaustible joy. This error 
was not removed by the evidence given before the Joint 
Select Committee. The managers did not make their 
case clear there, partly because they did not understand 
it, and partly because their most eminent witnesses were 



Preface 329 

not personally affected by it, and would not condescend 
to plead it, feeling themselves, on the contrary, com- 
pelled by their self-respect to admit and even emphasize 
the fact that the Lord Chamberlain in the exercise of 
his duties as licenser had done those things which he 
ought not to have done, and left undone those things 
which he ought to have done. Mr Forbes Robertson and 
Sir Herbert Tree, for instance, had never felt the real 
disadvantage of which managers have to complain. This 
disadvantage was not put directly to the Committee; and 
though the managers are against me on the question of 
the censorship, I will now put their case for them as 
they should have put it themselves, and as it can be read 
between the lines of their evidence when once the reader 
has the clue. 

The manager of a theatre is a man of business. He is 
not an expert in politics, religion, art, literature, philos- 
ophy, or law. He calls in a playwright just as he calls 
in a doctor, or consults a lawyer, or engages an 
architect, depending on the playwright's reputation and 
past achievements for a satisfactory result. A play by 
an unknown man may attract him sufficiently to induce 
him to give that unknown man a trial; but this does not 
occur often enough to be taken into accoimt: his normal 
course is to resort to a well-known author and take 
(mostly with misgiving) what he gets from him. Now 
this does not cause any anxiety to Mr Forbes Robertson 
and Sir Herbert Tree, because they are only incidentally 
managers and men of business : primarily they are highly 
cultivated artists, quite capable of judging for them- 
selves anything that the most abstruse playwright is 
likely to put before them. But the plain sailing trades- 
man who must be taken as the typical manager (for the 
west end of London is not the whole theatrical world) 
is by no means equally qualified to judge whether a play 
is safe from prosecution or not. He may not understand 



330 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

it^ may not like it, may not know what the author is 
driving at, may have no knowledge of the ethical, polit- 
ical, and sectarian controversies which may form the in- 
tellectual fabric of the play, and may honestly see noth- 
ing but an ordinary " character part " in a stage figure 
which may be a libellous and unmistakeable caricature of 
some eminent living person of whom he has never heard. 
Yet if he produces the play he is legally responsible 
just as if he had written it himself. Without protection 
he may find himself in the dock answering a charge of 
blasphemous libel, seditious libel, obscene libel, or all 
three together, not to mention the possibility of a private 
action for defamatory libel. His sole refuge is the opin- 
ion of the Examiner of Plays, his sole protection the 
licence of the Lord Chamberlain. A refusal to license 
does not hurt him, because he can produce another play: 
it is the author who suffers. The granting of the licence 
practically places him above the law; for though it may 
be legally possible to prosecute a licensed play, nobody 
ever dreams of doing it. The really responsible person, 
the Lord Chamberlain, could not be put into the dock; 
and the manager could not decently be convicted when 
he could procure in his defence a certificate from the 
chief officer of the King's household that the play was a 
proper one. 

A Two Guinea Insurance Policy 

The censorship, then, provides the manager, at the 
negligible premium of two guineas per play, with an 
effective insurance against the author getting him into 
trouble, and a complete relief from all conscientious re- 
sponsibility for the character of the entertainment at his 
theatre. Under such circumstances, managers would be 
more than human if they did not regard the censorship 
as their most valuable privilege. This is the simple ex- 



Preface 331 

planation of the rally of the managers and their Asso- 
ciations to the defence of the censorship, of their reit- 
erated resolutions of confidence in the Lord Chamber- 
lain, of their presentations of plate, and, generally, of 
their enthusiastic contentment with the present system, 
all in such startling contrast to the denunciations of the 
censorship by the authors. It also explains why the 
managerial witnesses who had least to fear from the 
Censor were the most reluctant in his defence, whilst 
those whose practice it is to strain his indulgence to the 
utmost were almost rapturous in his praise. There 
would be absolute unanimity among the managers in 
favor of the censorship if they were all simply trades- 
men. Even those actor-managers who made no secret 
before the Committee of their contempt for the present 
operation of the censorship, and their indignation at 
being handed over to a domestic official as casual serv- 
ants of a specially disorderly kind, demanded, not the 
abolition of the institution, but such a reform as might 
make it consistent with their dignity and unobstructive 
to their higher artistic aims. Feeling no personal need 
for protection against the author, they perhaps forgot 
the plight of many a manager to whom the modern ad- 
vanced drama is so much Greek; but they did feel very 
strongly the need of being protected against Vigilance 
Societies and Municipalities and common informers in a 
country where a large section of the commimity still be- 
lieves that art of all kinds is inherently sinful. 

Why the Government Interfered 

It may now be asked how a Liberal government had 
been persuaded to meddle at all with a question in which 
so many conflicting interests were involved, and which 
had probably no electoral value whatever. Many simple 
souls believed that it was because certain severely virtu- 



332 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

ous plays by Ibsen, by M. Brieux, by Mr Granville 
Barker, and by me, were suppressed by the censorship, 
whilst plays of a scandalous character were licensed 
without demur. No doubt this influenced public opinion ; 
but those who imagine that it could influence British 
governments little know how remote from public opinion 
and how full of their own little family and party affairs 
British governments, both Liberal and Unionist, still are. 
The censorship scandal had existed for years without 
any parliamentary action being taken in the matter, and 
might have existed for as many more had it not hap- 
pened in 1906 that Mr Robert Vernon Harcourt entered 
parliament as a member of the Liberal Party, of which 
his father had been one of the leaders during the Glad- 
stone era. Mr Harcourt was thus a young man marked 
out for office both by his parentage and his imquestion- 
able social position as one of the governing class. Also, 
and this was much less usual, he was brilliantly clever, 
and was the author of a couple of plays of remarkable 
promise. Mr Harcourt informed his leaders that he was 
going to take up the subject of the censorship. The 
leaders, recognizing his hereditary right to a parliament- 
ary canter of some sort as a prelude to his public career, 
and finding that all the clever people seemed to be 
agreed that the censorship was an anti-Liberal institu- 
tion and an abominable nuisance to boot, indulged him 
by appointing a Select Committee of both Houses to 
investigate the subject. The then Chancellor of the 
Duchy of Lancaster, Mr Herbert Samuel (now Post- 
master-General), who had made his way into the Cabinet 
twenty years ahead of the usual age, was made Chair- 
man. Mr Robert Harcourt himself was of course a 
member. With him, representing the Commons, were 
Mr Alfred Mason, a man of letters who had won a seat 
in parliament as offhandedly as he has since discarded it, 
or as he once appeared on the stage to help me out of 



Preface 333 

a difficulty in casting Arms and the Man when that piece 
was the newest thing in the advanced drama. There was 
Mr Hugh Law, an Irish member, son of an Irish Chan- 
cellor, presenting a keen and joyous front to English 
intellectual sloth. Above all, there was Colonel Lock- 
wood to represent at one stroke the Opposition and the 
average popular man. This he did by standing up gal- 
lantly for the Censor, to whose support the Opposition 
was in no way committed, and by visibly defying the 
most cherished conventions of the average man with a 
bunch of carnations in his buttonhole as large as a din- 
ner-plate, which would have made a Bunthorne blench, 
and which very nearly did make Mr Granville Barker 
(who has an antipathy to the scent of carnations) faint. 



The Peers on the Joint Select 
Committee 

The House of Lords then proceeded to its selection. 
As fashionable drama in Paris and London concerns 
itself almost exclusively with adultery, the first choice 
fell on Lord Gorell, who had for many years presided 
over the Divorce Court. Lord Plymouth, who had been 
Chairman to the Shakespear Memorial project (now 
merged in the Shakespear Memorial National Theatre) 
was obviously marked out for selection; and it was gen- 
erally expected that the Lords Lytton and Esher, who 
had taken a prominent part in the same movement, would 
have been added. This expectation was not fulfilled. 
Instead, Lord Willoughby de Broke, who had distin- 
guished himself as an amateur actor, was selected along 
with Lord Newton, whose special qualifications for the 
Committee, if he had any, were unknown to the public. 
Finally Lord Ribblesdale, the argute son of a Scotch 
mother, was thrown in to make up for any shortcoming 



334 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

ill intellectual subtlety that might arise in the case of his 
younger colleagues; and this completed the two teams. 

The Committee's Attitude towards 
the Theatre 

In England^ thanks chiefly to the censorship, the the- 
atre is not respected. It is indulged and despised as a 
department of what is politely called gaiety. It is there- 
fore not surprising that the majority of the Committee 
began by taking its work uppishly and carelessly. When 
it discovered that the contemporary drama, licensed by 
the Lord Chamberlain, included plays which could be 
described only behind closed doors, and in the discom- 
fort which attends discussions of very nasty subjects be- 
tween men of widely different ages, it calmly put its 
own convenience before its public duty by ruling that 
there should be no discussion of particular plays, much 
as if a committee on temperance were to rule that drunk- 
enness was not a proper subject of conversation among 
gentlemen. 

A Bad Beginning 

This was a bad beginning. Everybody knew that in 
England the censorship would not be crushed by the 
weight of the constitutional argument against it, heavy 
as that was, unless it were also brought home to the Com- 
mittee and to the public that it had sanctioned and pro- 
tected the very worst practicable examples of the kind 
of play it professed to extirpate. For it must be remem- 
bered that the other half of the practical side of the case, 
dealing with the merits of the plays it had suppressed, 
could never secure a unanimous assent. If the Censor 
had suppressed Hamlet, as he most certainly would have 
done had it been submitted to him as a new play, he 



Preface 335 

would have been supported by a large body of people to 
whom incest is a tabooed subject which must not be men- 
tioned on the stage or anywhere else outside a criminal 
court. Hamlet, Oedipus, and The Cenci, Mrs Warren's 
Profession, Brieux's Maternite, and Les Avaries, Maeter- 
linck's Monna Vanna and Mr. Granville Barker's Waste 
may or may not be great poems, or edifying sermons, or 
important documents, or charming romances : our tribal 
citizens know nothing about that and do not want to 
know anything: all that they do know is that incest, 
prostitution, abortion, contagious diseases, and nudity 
are improper, and that all conversations, or books, or 
plays in which they are discussed are improper conversa- 
tions, improper books, improper plays, and should not 
be allowed. The Censor may prohibit all such plays 
with complete certainty that there will be a chorus of 
" Quite right too " sufficient to drown the protests of 
the few who know better. The Achilles heel of the cen- 
sorship is therefore not the fine plays it has suppressed, 
but the abominable plays it has licensed : plays which 
the Committee itself had to turn the public out of the 
room and close the doors before it could discuss, and 
which I myself have found it impossible to expose in the 
press because no editor of a paper or magazine intended 
for general family reading could admit into his columns 
the baldest narration of the stories which the Censor has 
not only tolerated but expressly certified as fitting for 
presentation on the stage. When the Committee ruled 
out this part of the case it shook the confidence of the 
authors in its impartiality and its seriousness. Of course 
it was not able to enforce its ruling thoroughly. Plays 
which were merely lightminded and irresponsible in their 
viciousness were repeatedly mentioned by Mr Harcourt 
and others. But the really detestable plays, which would 
have damned the censorship beyond all apology or sal- 
vation, were never referred to; and the moment Mr Har- 



336 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

court or anyone else made the Committee uncomfortable 
by a move in their direction, the ruling was appealed to 
at once, and the censorship saved. 



A Comic Interlude 

It was part of this nervous dislike of the unpleasant 
part of its business that led to the comic incident of 
the Committee's sudden discovery that I had insulted it, 
and its suspension of its investigation for the purpose of 
elaborately insulting me back again. Comic to the look- 
ers-on, that is; for the majority of the Committee made 
no attempt to conceal the fact that they were wildly 
angry with me; and I, though my public experience and 
skill in acting enabled me to maintain an appearance of 
imperturbable good-humor, was equally furious. The 
friction began as follows. 

The precedents for the conduct of the Committee were 
to be found in the proceedings of the Committee of 1892. 
That Committee, no doubt recognizing the absurdity of 
calling on distinguished artists to give their views be- 
fore it, and then refusing to allow them to state their 
views except in nervous replies to such questions as it 
might suit members to put to them, allowed Sir Henry 
Irving and Sir John Hare to prepare and read written 
statements, and formally invited them to read them to 
the Committee before being questioned. I accordingly 
prepared such a statement. For the greater convenience 
of the Committee, I offered to have this statement 
printed at my own expense, and to supply the members 
with copies. The offer was accepted ; and the copies 
supplied. I also offered to provide the Committee with 
copies of those plays of mine which had been refused a 
licence by the Lord Chamberlain. That offer also was 
accepted; and the books duly supplied. 



^ 



Preface 337 

An Anti- Shavian Panic 

As far as I can guess, the next thing that happened 
was that some timid or unawakened member of the Com- 
mittee read my statement and was frightened or scan- 
dalized out of his wits by it. At all events it is certain 
that the majority of the Committee allowed themselves to 
be persuaded to refuse to allow any statement to be 
read; but to avoid the appearance of pointing this ex- 
pressly at me, the form adopted was a resolution to ad- 
here strictly to precedent, the Committee being then un- 
aware that the precedents were on my side. Accord- 
ingly, when I appeared before the Committee, and pro- 
posed to read my statement " according to precedent," 
the Committee was visibly taken aback. The Chairman 
was bound by the letter of the decision arrived at to 
allow me to read my statement, since that course was 
according to precedent; but as this was exactly what 
the decision was meant to prevent, the majority of 
the Committee would have regarded this hoisting of them 
with their own petard as a breach of faith on the part 
of the Chairman, who, I infer, was not in agreement with 
the suppressive majority. There was nothing for it, 
after a somewhat awkward pause, but to clear me and 
the public out of the room and reconsider the situation in 
camera. When the doors were opened again I was in- 
formed simply that the Committee would not hear my 
statement. But as the Committee could not very de- 
cently refuse my evidence altogether, the Chairman, Avith 
a printed copy of my statement in his hand as " proof," 
was able to come to the rescue to some extent by putting 
to me a series of questions to which no doubt I might 
have replied by taking another copy out of my pocket, 
and quoting my statement paragraph by paragraph, as 
some of the later witnesses did. But as in offering the 
Committee my statement for burial in their bluebook I 



338 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

had made a considerable sacrifice, being able to secure 
greater publicity for it by independent publication on my 
own account; and as, further, the circumstances of the 
refusal made it offensive enough to take all heart out of 
the scrupulous consideration with which I had so far 
treated the Committee, I was not disposed to give its 
majority a second chance, or to lose the opportunity 
offered me by the questions to fire an additional broad- 
side into the censorship. I pocketed my statement, and 
answered the questions viva voce. At the conclusion of 
this, my examination-in-chief, the Committee adjourned, 
asking me to present mj'^self again for (virtually) cross- 
examination. But this cross-examination never came off, 
as the sequel will shew. 

A Rare and Curious First Edition 

The refusal of the Committee to admit my statement 
had not unnaturally created the impression that it must 
be a scandalous document; and a lively demand for cop- 
ies at once set in. And among the very first applicants 
were members of the majority which had carried the de- 
cision to exclude the document. They had given so little 
attention to the business that they did not know, or had 
forgotten, that they had already been supplied with cop- 
ies at their own request. At all events, they came to me 
publicly and cleaned me out of the handful of copies I 
had provided for distribution to the press. And after 
the sitting it was intimated to me that yet more copies 
were desired for the use of the Committee: a demand, 
under the circinnstances, of breath-bereaving coolness. 
At the same time, a brisk demand arose outside the Com- 
mittee, not only among people who were anxious to read 
what I had to say on the subject, but among victims of 
the craze for collecting first editions, copies of privately 
circulated pamphlets, and other real or imaginary rari- 



Preface 339 

ties, and who will cheerfully pay five guineas for any 
piece of discarded old rubbish of mine when they will 
not pay four-and-sixpence for this book because every- 
one else can get it for four-and-sixpence too. 

The Times to the Rescue 

The day after the refusal of the Committee to face my 
statement, I transferred the scene of action to the col- 
umns of The Times, which did yeoman's service to the 
public on this, as on many other occasions, by treating 
the question as a public one without the least regard to 
the supposed susceptibilities of the Court on the one 
side, or the avowed prejudices of the Free Churches or 
the interests of the managers or theatrical speculators 
on the other. The Times published the summarized con- 
clusions of my statement, and gave me an opportunity 
of saying as much as it was then advisable to say of 
what had occurred. For it must be remembered that, 
however impatient and contemptuous I might feel of the 
intellectual cowardice shewn by the majority of the Com- 
mittee face to face with myself, it was none the less nec- 
essary to keep up its prestige in every possible way, not 
only for the sake of the dignity and importance of the 
matter with which it had to deal, and in the hope that 
the treatment of subsequent witnesses and the final re- 
port might make amends for a feeble beginning, but also 
out of respect and consideration for the minority. For 
it is fair to say that the majority was never more than 
a bare majority, and that the worst thing the Committee 
did — the exclusion of references to particular plays — 
was perpetrated in the absence of the Chairman. 

I, therefore, had to treat the Committee in The Times 
very much better than its majority deserved, an injustice 
for which I now apologize. I did not, however, resist 
the temptation to hint, quite good-humoredly, that my 



340 The She wing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

politeness to the Committee had cost me quite enough 
already, and that I was not prepared to supply the mem- 
bers of the Committee, or anyone else, with extra copies 
merely as collectors' curiosities. 

The Council of Ten 

Then the fat was in the fire. The majority, chaffed 
for its eagerness to obtain copies of scarce pamphlets 
retailable at five guineas, went dancing mad. When I 
presented myself, as requested, for cross-examination, I 
found the doors of the Committee room shut, and the 
corridors of the House of Lords filled by a wondering 
crowd, to whom it had somehow leaked out that some- 
thing terrible was happening inside. It could not be 
another licensed play too scandalous to be discussed in 
public, because the Committee had decided to discuss no 
more of these examples of the Censor's notions of puri- 
fying the stage; and what else the Committee might 
have to discuss that might not be heard by all the world 
was not easily guessable. 

Without suggesting that the confidence of the Com- 
mittee was in any way violated by any of its members 
further than was absolutely necessary to clear them from 
suspicion of complicity in the scene which followed, I 
think I may venture to conjecture what was happening. 
It was felt by the majority, first, that it must be cleared 
at all costs of the imputation of having procured more 
than one copy each of my statement, and that one not 
from any interest in an undesirable document by an ir- 
reverent author, but in the reluctant discharge of its sol- 
emn public duty ; second, that a terrible example must be 
made of me by the most crushing public snub in the 
power of the Committee to administer. To throw my 
wretched little pamphlet at my head and to kick me out 
of the room was the passionate impulse which prevailed 



Preface 341 

in spite of all the remonstrances of the Commoners, sea- 
soned to the give-and-take of public life, and of the 
single peer who kept his head. The others, for the mo- 
ment, had no heads to keep. And the fashion in which 
they proposed to wreak their vengeance was as follows. 

The Sentence 

I was to be admitted, as a lamb to the slaughter, and 
allowed to take my place as if for further examination. 
The Chairman was then to inform me coldly that the 
Committee did not desire to have anything more to say 
to me. The members were thereupon solemnly to hand 
me back the copies of my statement as so much waste 
paper, and I was to be suffered to slink away with what 
countenance I could maintain in such disgrace. 

But this plan required the active co-operation of every 
member of the Committee; and whilst the majority re- 
garded it as an august and impressive vindication of the 
majesty of parliament, the minority regarded it with 
equal conviction as a puerile tomfoolery, and declined 
altogether to act their allotted parts in it. Besides, they 
did not all want to part with the books. For instance, 
Mr Hugh Law, being an Irishman, with an Irishman's 
sense of how to behave like a gallant gentleman on occa- 
sion, was determined to be able to assure me that nothing 
should induce him to give up my statement or prevent 
him from obtaining and cherishing as many copies as 
possible. (I quote this as an example to the House of 
Lords of the right thing to say in such emergencies). 
So the program had to be modified. The minority could 
not prevent the enraged majority from refusing to exam- 
ine me further; nor could the Chairman refuse to com- 
municate that decision to me. Neither could the minor- 
ity object to the secretary handing me back such copies 
as he could collect from the majority. And at that the 



342 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

matter was left. The doors were opened; the audience 
trooped in; I was called to my place in the dock (so to 
speak) ; and all was ready for the sacrifice. 

The Execution 

Alas! the majority reckoned without Colonel Lock- 
wood. That hardy and undaunted veteran refused to 
shirk his share in the scene merely because the minority 
was recalcitrant and the majority perhaps subject to 
stage fright. When Mr Samuel had informed me that 
the Committee had no further questions to ask me with 
an urbanity which gave the public no clue as to the tem- 
per of the majority; when I had jumped up with the 
proper air of relief and gratitude; when the secretary 
had handed me his little packet of books with an affa- 
bility which effectually concealed his dramatic function 
as executioner; when the audience was simply disap- 
pointed at being baulked of the entertainment of hearing 
Mr Robert Harcourt cross-examine me; in short, when 
the situation was all but saved by the tact of the Chair- 
man and secretary, Colonel Lockwood rose, with all his 
carnations blazing, and gave away the whole case by 
handing me, with impressive simplicity and courtesy, his 
two copies of the precious statement. And I believe that 
if he had succeeded in securing ten, he would have 
handed them all back to me with the most sincere convic- 
tion that every one of the ten must prove a crushing ad- 
dition to the weight of my discomfiture. I still cherish 
that second copy, a little blue-bound pamphlet, method- 
ically autographed " Lockwood B " among my most val- 
ued literary trophies. 

An innocent lady told me afterwards that she never 
knew that I could smile so beautifully, and that she 
thought it shewed very good taste on my part. I was 
not conscious of smiling; but I should have embraced 



Preface 343 

the Colonel had I dared. As it was, I turned expectantly 
to his colleagues, mutely inviting them to follow his ex- 
ample. But there was only one Colonel Lockwood on 
that Committee. No eye met mine except minority eyes, 
dancing with mischief. There was nothing more to be 
said. I went home to my morning's work, and returned 
in the afternoon to receive the apologies of the minority 
for the conduct of the majority, and to see Mr Granville 
Barker, overwhelmed by the conscience-stricken polite- 
ness of the now almost abject Committee, and by a pow- 
erful smell of carnations, heading the long list of play- 
wrights who came there to testify against the censorship, 
and whose treatment, I am happy to say, was everything 
they could have desired. 

After all, ridiculous as the scene was. Colonel Lock- 
wood's simplicity and courage were much more service- 
able to his colleagues than their own inept coup de the- 
atre would have been if he had not spoiled it. It was 
plain to every one that he had acted in entire good faith, 
without a thought as to these apparently insignificant 
little books being of any importance or having caused me 
or anybody else any trouble, and that he was wounded 
in his most sensitive spot by the construction my Times 
letter had put on his action. And in Colonel Lockwood's 
case one saw the case of his party on the Committee. 
They had simply been thoughtless in the matter. 

I hope nobody will suppose that this in any way ex- 
onerates them. When people accept public service for 
one of the most vital duties that can arise in our society, 
they have no right to be thoughtless. In spite of the 
fun of the scene on the surface, my public sense was, 
and still is, very deeply offended by it. It made an end 
for me of the claim of the majority to be taken seriously. 
Wlien the Government comes to deal with the question, 
as it presumably will before long, I invite it to be guided 
by the Chairman, the minority, and by the witnesses ac- 



344 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

cording to their weight, and to pay no attention whatever 
to those recommendations which were obviously inserted 
solely to conciliate the majority and get the report 
through and the Committee done with. 

My evidence will be found in the Bluebook, pp. 46-53. 
And here is the terrible statement which the Committee 
went through so much to suppress. 



THE REJECTED STATEMENT 

Part I 

The Witness's Qualifications 

I AM by profession a playwright. I have been in prac- 
tice since 1892. I am a member of the Managing Com- 
mittee of the Society of Authors and of the Dramatic 
Sub-Committee of that body. I have written nineteen 
plays, some of which have been translated and performed 
in all European countries except Turkey, Greece, and 
Portugal. They have been performed extensively in 
America. Three of them have been refused licences by 
the Lord Chamberlain. In one case a licence has since 
been granted. The other two are still unlicensed. I 
have suffered both in pocket and reputation by the action 
of the Lord Chamberlain. In other countries I have not 
come into conflict with the censorship except in Austria, 
where the production of a comedy of mine was post- 
poned for a year because it alluded to the part taken by 
Austria in the Servo-Bulgarian war. This comedy was 
not one of the plays suppressed in England by the Lord 
Chamberlain. One of the plays so suppressed was 
prosecuted in America by the police in consequence of 
an immense crowd of disorderly persons having been 
attracted to the first performance by the Lord Chamber- 
lain's condemnation of it; but on appeal to a higher 
court it was decided that the representation was lawful 
and the intention innocent, since when it has been re- 
peatedly performed. 

I am not an ordinary playwright in general practice. 
345 



346 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

I am a specialist in immoral and heretical plays. My 
reputation has been gained by my persistent struggle to 
force the public to reconsider its morals. In particular, 
I regard much current morality as to economic and sex- 
ual relations as disastrously wrong ; and I regard certain 
doctrines of the Christian religion as understood in Eng- 
land to-day with abhorrence. I write plays with the de- 
liberate object of converting the nation to my opinions 
in these matters. I have no other effectual incentive to 
write plays, as I am not dependent on the theatre for 
my livelihood. If I were prevented from producing im- 
moral and heretical plays, I should cease to write for the 
theatre, and propagate my views from the platform and 
through books. I mention these facts to shew that I 
have a special interest in the achievement by my profes- 
sion of those rights of liberty of speech and conscience 
which are matters of course in other professions. I ob- 
ject to censorship not merely because the existing form 
of it grievously injures and hinders me individually, but 
on public grounds. 

The Definition of Immorality 

In dealing with the question of the censorship, every- 
thing depends on the correct use of the word immorality, 
and a careful discrimination between the powers of a 
magistrate or judge to administer a code, and those of 
a censor to please himself. 

Whatever is contrary to established manners and cus- 
toms is immoral. An immoral act or doctrine is not nec- 
essarily a sinful one: on the contrary, every advance in 
thought and conduct is by definition immoral until it 
has converted the majority. For this reason it is of the 
most enormous importance that immorality should be 
protected jealously against the attacks of those who have 
no standard except the standard of custom, and who re- 



The Rejected Statement 347 

gard any attack on custom — that is^ on morals — as an 
attack on society, on religion, and on virtue. 

A censor is never intentionally a protector of immoral- 
ity. He always aims at the protection of morality. Now^ 
morality is extremely valuable to society. It imposes 
conventional conduct on the great mass of persons who 
are incapable of original ethical judgment, and who 
would be quite lost if they were not in leading-strings 
devised by lawgivers, philosophers, prophets and poets 
for their guidance. But morality is not dependent on 
censorship for protection. It is already powerfully for- 
tified by the magistracy and the whole body of law. 
Blasphemy, indecency, libel, treason, sedition, obscenity, 
profanity, and all the other evils which a censorship is 
supposed to avert, are punishable by the civil magistrate 
with all the severity of vehement prejudice. Morality 
has not only every engine that lawgivers can devise in 
full operation for its protection, but also that enormous 
weight of public opinion enforced by social ostracism 
which is stronger than all the statutes. A censor pre- 
tending to protect morality is like a child pushing the 
cushions of a railway carriage to give itself the sen- 
sation of making the train travel at sixty miles an hour. 
It is immorality, not morality, that needs protection: it 
is morality, not immorality, that needs restraint; for 
morality, with all the dead weight of human inertia and 
superstition to hang on the back of the pioneer, and all 
the malice of vulgarity and prejudice to threaten him, 
is responsible for many persecutions and many mar- 
tyrdoms. 

Persecutions and martyrdoms, however, are trifles 
compared to the mischief done by censorships in delay- 
ing the general march of enlightenment. This can be 
brought home to us by imagining what would have been 
the effect of applying to all literature the censorship we 
still apply to the stage. The works of Linnaeus and 



348 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

the evolutionists of 1790-1830, of Darwin, Wallace, 
Huxley, Helmholtz, Tyndall, Spencer, Carlyle, Ruskin, 
and Samuel Butler, would not have been published, as 
they were all immoral and heretical in the very highest 
degree, and gave pain to many worthy and pious people. 
They are at present condemned by the Greek and 
Roman Catholic censorships as unfit for general reading. 
A censorship of conduct would have been equally disas- 
trous. The disloyalty of Hampden and of Washington; 
the revolting immorality of Luther in not only marrying 
when he was a priest, but actually marrying a nun ; the 
heterodoxy of Galileo; the shocking blasphemies and 
sacrileges of Mohammed against the idols whom he de- 
throned ,to make way for his conception of one god ; the 
still more startling blasphemy of Jesus when he declared 
God to be the son of man and himself to be the son of 
God, are all examples of shocking immoralities (every 
immorality shocks somebody), the suppression and ex- 
tinction of which would have been more disastrous than 
the utmost mischief that can be conceived as ensuing 
from the toleration of vice. 

These facts, glaring as they are, are disguised by the 
promotion of immoralities into moralities which is con- 
stantly going on. Christianity and Mohammedanism, 
once thought of and dealt with exactly as Anarchism is 
thought of and dealt with today, have become established 
religions ; and fresh immoralities are presecuted in their 
name. The truth is that the vast majority of persons pro- 
fessing these religions have never been anything but sim- 
ple moralists. The respectable Englishman who is a 
Christian because he was born in Clapham would be a 
Mohammedan for the cognate reason if he had been born 
in Constantinople. He has never willingly tolerated 
immorality. He did not adopt any innovation until it 
had become moral; and then he adopted it, not on its 
merits, but solely because it had become moral. In doing 



The Rejected Statement 349 

so he never realized that it had ever been immoral: con- 
sequently its early struggles taught him no lesson; and 
he has opposed the next step in human progress as in- 
dignantly as if neither manners, customs, nor thought 
had ever changed since the beginning of the world. Tol- 
eration must be imposed on him as a mystic and painful 
duty by his spiritual and political leaders, or he will 
condemn the world to stagnation, which is the penalty 
of an inflexible morality. 

What Toleration Means 

This must be done all the more arbitrarily because it 
is not possible to make the ordinary moral man under- 
stand what toleration and liberty really mean. He will 
accept them verbally with alacrity, even with enthusiasm, 
because the word toleration has been moralized by emi- 
nent Whigs ; but what he means by toleration is tolera- 
tion of doctrines that he considers enlightened, and, by 
liberty, liberty to do what he considers right: that is, 
he does not mean toleration or liberty at all; for there 
is no need to tolerate what appears enlightened or to 
claim liberty to do what most people consider right. 
Toleration and liberty have no sense or use except as 
toleration of opinions that are considered damnable, and 
liberty to do what seems wrong. Setting Englishmen 
free to marry their deceased wife's sisters is not tolerated 
by the people who approve of it, but by the people who 
regard it as incestuous. Catholic Emancipation and the 
admission of Jews to parliament needed no toleration 
from Catholics and Jews : the toleration they needed was 
that of the people who regarded the one measure as a 
facilitation of idolatry, and the other as a condonation 
of the crucifixion. Clearly such toleration is not clam- 
ored for by the multitude or by the press which reflects 
its prejudices. It is essentially one of those abnegations 



350 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

of passion and prejudice which the common man submits 
to because uncommon men whom he respects as wiser 
than himself assure him that it must be so, or the higher 
affairs of human destiny will suffer. 

Such admission is the more difficult because the argu- 
ments against tolerating immorality are the same as 
the arguments against tolerating murder and theft; and 
this is why the Censor seems to the inconsiderate as ob- 
viously desirable a functionary as the police magistrate. 
But there is this simple and tremendous difference be- 
tween the cases : that whereas no evil can conceivably 
result from the total suppression of murder and theft, 
and all communities prosper in direct proportion to such 
suppression, the total suppression of immorality, espe- 
cially in matters of religion and sex, would stop enlight- 
enment, and produce what used to be called a Chinese 
civilization until the Chinese lately took to immoral 
courses by permitting railway contractors to desecrate 
the graves of their ancestors, and their soldiers to wear 
clothes which indecently revealed the fact that they had 
legs and waists and even posteriors. At about the same 
moment a few bold Englishwomen ventured on the im- 
morality of riding astride their horses, a practice that 
has since established itself so successfully that before 
another generation has passed away there may not be a 
new side-saddle in England or a woman who could use 
it if there was. 



The Case for Toleration 

Accordingly, there has risen among wise and far- 
sighted men a perception of the need for setting certain 
departments of human activity entirely free from legal 
interference. This has nothing to do with any sympa- 
thy these liberators may themselves have with immoral 
views. A man with the strongest conviction of the Di- 



The Rejected Statement 351 

vine ordering of the universe and of the superiority of 
monarchy to all forms of government may nevertheless 
quite consistently and conscientiously be ready to lay 
down his life for the right of every man to advocate 
Atheism or Republicanism if he believes in them. An 
attack on morals may turn out to be the salvation of the 
race. A hundred years ago nobody foresaw that Tom 
Paine's centenary would be the subject of a laudatory 
special article in The Times; and only a few understood 
that the persecution of his works and the transportation 
of men for the felony of reading them was a mischievous 
mistake. Even less, perhaps, could they have guessed 
that Proudhon, who became notorious by his essay en- 
titled " What is Property? It is Theft" would have re- 
ceived, on the like occasion and in the same paper, a 
respectful consideration which nobody would now dream 
of according to Lord Liverpool or Lord Brougham. 
Nevertheless there was a mass of evidence to shew that 
such a development was not only possible but fairly 
probable, and that the risks of suppressing liberty of 
propaganda were far greater than the risk of Paine's or 
Proudhon's writings wrecking civilization. Now there 
was no such evidence in favor of tolerating the cutting 
of throats and the robbing of tills. No case whatever 
can be made out for the statement that a nation cannot 
do without common thieves and homicidal ruffians. But 
an overwhelming case can be made out for the statement 
that no nation can prosper or even continue to exist 
without heretics and advocates of shockingly immoral 
doctrines. The Inquisition and the Star Chamber, which 
were nothing but censorships, made ruthless war on im- 
piety and immorality. The result was once familiar to 
Englishmen, though of late years it seems to have been 
forgotten. It cost England a revolution to get rid of 
the Star Chamber. Spain did not get rid of the Inqui- 
sition, and paid for that omission by becoming a barely 



352 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

third-rate power politically, and intellectually no power 
at all, in the Europe she had once dominated as the 
mightiest of the Christian empires. 

The Limits to Toleration 

But the large toleration these considerations dictate 
has limits. For example, though we tolerate, and rightly 
tolerate, the propaganda of Anarchism as a political the- 
ory which embraces all that is valuable in the doctrine 
of Laisser-Faire and the method of Free Trade as well 
as all that is shocking in the views of Bakounine, we 
clearly cannot, or at all events will not, tolerate assas- 
sination of rulers on the ground that it is " propaganda 
by deed " or sociological experiment. A play inciting to 
such an assassination cannot claim the privileges of her- 
esy or immorality, because no case can be made out in 
support of assassination as an indispensable instrument I 
of progress. Now it happens that we have in the Julius » 
Caesar of Shakespear a play which the Tsar of Russia or 
the Governor-General of India would hardly care to see j 
performed in their capitals just now. It is an artistic f 
treasure; but it glorifies a murder which Goethe de- 
scribed as the silliest crime ever committed. It may 
quite possibly have helped the regicides of l64<9 to see 
themselves, as it certainly helped generations of Whig 
statesmen to see them, in a heroic light; and it unques- 
tionably vindicates and ennobles a conspirator who 
assassinated the head of the Roman State not because he 
abused his position but solely because he occupied it, 
thus affirming the extreme republican principle that all 
kings, good or bad, should be killed because kingship 
and freedom cannot live together. Under certain cir- 
cumstances this vindication and ennoblement might act 
as an incitement to an actual assassination as well as to 
Plutarchian republicanism; for it is one thing to advo- 



The Rejected Statement 353 

cate republicanism or royalism: it is quite another to 
make a hero of Brutus or Ravaillac, or a heroine of 
Charlotte Corday. Assassination is the extreme form of 
censorship; and it seems hard to justify an incitement to 
it on anti-censorial principles. The very people who 
would have scouted the notion of prohibiting the per- 
formances of Julius Caesar at His Majesty's Theatre in 
London last year, might now entertain very seriously a 
proposal to exclude Indians from them, and to suppress 
the play completely in Calcutta and Dublin; for if the 
assassin of Caesar was a hero, why not the assassins of 
Lord Frederick Cavendish, Presidents Lincoln and 
McKinley, and Sir Curzon Wyllie? Here is a strong 
case for some constitutional means of preventing the per- 
formance of a play. True, it is an equally strong case 
for preventing the circulation of the Bible, which was 
always in the hands of our regicides ; but as the Roman 
Catholic Church does not hesitate to accept that conse- 
quence of the censorial principle, it does not invalidate 
the argument. 

Take another actual case. A modern comedy. Arms 
and The Man, though not a comedy of politics, is never- 
theless so far historical that it reveals the unacknowl- 
edged fact that as the Servo-Bulgarian War of 1885 
was much more than a struggle between the Servians 
and Bulgarians, the troops engaged were officered by 
two European Powers of the first magnitude. In conse- 
quence, the performance of the play was for some time 
forbidden in Vienna, and more recently it gave offence 
in Rome at a moment when popular feeling was excited 
as to the relations of Austria with the Balkan States. 
Now if a comedy so remote from political passion as 
Arms and The Man can, merely because it refers to po- 
litical facts, become so inconvenient and inopportune 
that Foreign Offices take the trouble to have its produc- 
tion postponed, what may not be the effect of what is 



354 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

called a patriotic drama produced at a moment when the 
balance is quivering between peace and war? Is there 
not something to be said for a political censorship, if 
not for a moral one ? May not those continental govern- 
ments who leave the stage practically free in every other 
respect, but muzzle it politically, be justified by the 
practical exigencies of the situation? 

The Difference between Law and 
Censorship 

The answer is that a pamphlet, a newspaper article, or 
a resolution moved at a political meeting can do all the 
mischief that a play can, and often more ; yet we do not 
set up a permanent censorship of the press or of political 
meetings. Any journalist may publish an article, any 
demagogue may deliver a speech without giving notice 
to the government or obtaining its licence. The risk of 
such freedom is great; but as it is the price of our po- 
litical liberty, we think it worth paying. We may abro- 
gate it in emergencies by a Coercion Act, a suspension 
of the Habeas Corpus Act, or a proclamation of martial 
law, just as we stop the traffic in a street during a fire, 
or shoot thieves at sight if they loot after an earthquake. 
But when the emergency is past, liberty is restored 
everywhere except in the theatre. The Act of 1843 is a 
permanent Coercion Act for the theatre, a permanent 
suspension of the Habeas Corpus Act as far as plays are 
concerned, a permanent proclamation of martial law with 
a single official substituted for a court martial. It is, in 
fact, assumed that actors, playwrights, and theatre man- 
agers are dangerous and dissolute characters whose ex- 
istence creates a chronic state of emergency, and who 
must be treated as earthquake looters are treated. It is 
not necessary now to discredit this assumption. It was 
broken down by the late Sir Henry Irving when he 



The Rejected Statement 355 

finally shamed the Government into extending to his pro- 
fession the official recognition enjoyed by the other 
branches of fine art. To-day we have on the roll of 
knighthood actors, authors, and managers. The rogue 
and vagabond theory of the depravity of the theatre is 
as dead officially as it is in general society; and with it 
has perished the sole excuse for the Act of 1843 and 
for the denial to the theatre of the liberties secured, at 
far greater social risk, to the press and the platform. 

There is no question here of giving the theatre any 
larger liberties than the press and the platform, or of 
claiming larger powers for Shakespear to eulogize Brutus 
than Lord Rosebery has to eulogize Cromwell. The 
abolition of the censorship does not involve the abolition 
of the magistrate and of the whole civil and criminal 
code. On the contrary it would make the theatre more 
effectually subject to them than it is at present; for once 
a play now runs the gauntlet of the censorship, it is 
practically placed above the law. It is almost humiliat- 
ing to have to demonstrate the essential difference be- 
tween a censor and a magistrate or a sanitary inspector; 
but it is impossible to ignore the carelessness with which 
even distinguished critics of the theatre assume that all 
the arguments proper to the support of a magistracy and 
body of jurisprudence apply equally to a censorship. 

A magistrate has laws to administer: a censor has 
nothing but his own opinion. A judge leaves the ques- 
tion of guilt to the jury: the Censor is jury and judge 
as well as lawgiver. A magistrate may be strongly 
prejudiced against an atheist or an anti-vaccinator, just 
as a sanitary inspector may have formed a careful opin- 
ion that drains are less healthy than cesspools ; but the 
magistrate must allow the atheist to affirm instead of 
to swear, and must grant the anti-vaccinator an exemp- 
tion certificate, when their demands are lawfully made; 
and in cities the inspector must compel the builder to 



356 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

make drains and must prosecute him if he makes cess- 
pools. The law may be only the intolerance of the com- 
munity; but it is a defined and limited intolerance. The 
limitation is sometimes carried so far that a judge can- 
not inflict the penalty for housebreaking on a burglar 
who can prove that he found the door open and there- 
fore made only an unlawful entry. On the other hand, 
it is sometimes so vague, as for example in the case of 
the American law against obscenity, that it makes the 
magistrate virtually a censor. But in the main a citizen 
can ascertain what he may do and what he may not do; 
and, though no one knows better than a magistrate that 
a single ill-conducted family may demoralize a whole 
street, no magistrate can imprison or otherwise restrain 
its members on the ground that their immorality may 
corrupt their neighbors. He can prevent any citizen 
from carrying certain specified weapons, but not from 
handling pokers, table-knives, bricks or bottles of cor- 
rosive fluid, on the ground that he might use them to 
commit murder or inflict malicious injury. He has no 
general power to prevent citizens from selling unhealthy 
or poisonous substances, or judging for themselves what 
substances are unhealthy and what wholesome, what 
poisonous and what innocuous: what he can do is to 
prevent anybody who has not a specific qualification 
from selling certain specified poisons of which a sched- 
ule is kept. Nobody is forbidden to sell minerals with- 
out a licence; but everybody is forbidden to sell silver 
without a licence. When the law has forgotten some 
atrocious sin — for instance, contracting marriage whilst 
suffering from contagious disease — the magistrate can- 
not arrest or punish the wrongdoer, however he may 
abhor his wickedness. In short, no man is lawfully at 
the mercy of the magistrate's personal caprice, preju- 
dice, ignorance, superstition, temper, stupidity, resent- 
ment, timidity, ambition, or private conviction. But a 



The Rejected Statement 357 

playwright's livelihood, his reputation, and his inspira- 
tion and mission are at the personal mercy of the Censor. 
The two do not stand, as the criminal and the judge 
stand, in the presence of a law that binds them both 
equally, and was made by neither of them, but by the 
deliberative collective wisdom of the community^. The 
only law that affects them is the Act of 1843, which em- 
powers one of them to do absolutely and finally what he 
likes with the other's work. And when it is remembered 
that the slave in this case is the man whose profession is 
that of Eschylus and Euripides, of Shakespear and 
Goethe, of Tolstoy and Ibsen, and the master the holder 
of a party appointment which by the nature of its duties 
practically excludes the possibility of its acceptance by 
a serious statesman or great lawyer, it will be seen that 
the playwrights are justified in reproaching the framers 
of that Act for having failed not only to appreciate the 
immense importance of the theatre as a most powerful 
instrument for teaching the nation how and what to 
think and feel, but even to conceive that those who make 
their living by the theatre are normal human beings with 
the common rights of English citizens. In this extrem- 
ity of inconsiderateness it is not surprising that they also 
did not trouble themselves to study the difference be- 
tween a censor and a magistrate. And it will be found 
that almost all the people who disinterestedly defend 
the censorship today are defending him on the assump- 
tion that there is no constitutional difference between 
him and any other functionary whose duty it is to re- 
strain crime and disorder. 

One further difference remains to be noted. As a 
magistrate grows old his mind may change or decay; 
but the law remains the same. The censorship of the 
theatre fluctuates with every change in the views and 
character of the man who exercises it. And what this 
implies can only be appreciated by those who can imag- 



358 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

ine what the effect on the mind must be of the duty of 
reading through every play that is produced in the king- 
dom year in, year out. 



Why the Lord Chamberlain? 

What may be called the high political case against 
censorship as a principle is now complete. The plead- 
ings are those which have already freed books and pul- 
pits and political platforms in England from censor- 
ship, if not from occasional legal persecution. The stage 
alone remains under a censorship of a grotesquely un- 
suitable kind. No play can be performed if the Lord 
Chamberlain happens to disapprove of it. And the Lord 
Chamberlain's functions have no sort of relationship to 
dramatic literature. A great judge of literature, a far- 
seeing statesman, a born champion of liberty of con- 
science and intellectual integrity — say a Milton, a Ches- 
terfield, a Bentham — would be a very bad Lord Cham- 
berlain: so bad, in fact, that his exclusion from such a 
post may be regarded as decreed by natural law. On 
the other hand, a good Lord Chamberlain would be a 
stickler for morals in the narrowest sense, a busy-body, 
a man to whom a matter of two inches in the length of a 
gentleman's sword or the absence of a feather from a 
lady's head-dress would be a graver matter than the 
Habeas Corpus Act. The Lord Chamberlain, as Censor 
of the theatre, is a direct descendant of the King's Mas- 
ter of the Revels, appointed in 1544 by Henry VIII. to 
keep order among the players and musicians of that day 
when they performed at Court. This first appearance 
of the theatrical censor in politics as the whipper-in of 
the player, with its conception of the player as a rich 
man's servant hired to amuse him, and, outside his pro- 
fessional duties, as a gay, disorderly, anarchic spoilt 
child, half privileged, half outlawed, probably as much 



The Rejected Statement 359 

vagabond as actor, is the real foundation of the subjec- 
tion of the whole profession, actors, managers, authors 
and all, to the despotic authority of an officer whose 
business it is to preserve decorum among menials. It 
must be remembered that it was not until a hundred 
years later, in the reaction against the Puritans, that a 
woman could appear on the English stage without being 
pelted off as the Italian actresses were. The theatrical 
profession was regarded as a shameless one; and it is 
only of late years that actresses have at last succeeded in 
living down the assumption that actress and prostitute are 
synonymous terms, and made good their position in re- 
spectable society. This makes the survival of the old 
ostracism in the Act of 1843 intolerably galling; and 
though it explains the apparently unaccountable absurd- 
ity of choosing as Censor of dramatic literature an offi- 
cial whose functions and qualifications have nothing 
whatever to do with literature, it also explains why the 
present arrangement is not only criticized as an institu- 
tion, but resented as an insult. 

The Diplomatic Objection to the Lord 
Chamberlain 

There is another reason, quite unconnected with the 
susceptibilities of authors, which makes it undesirable 
that a member of the King's Household should be re- 
sponsible for the character and tendency of plays. The 
drama, dealing with all departments of human life, is 
necessarily political. Recent events have shown — what 
indeed needed no demonstration — ^that it is impossible 
to prevent inferences being made, both at home and 
abroad, from the action of the Lord Chamberlain. The 
most talked-about play of the present year (1909), An 
Englishman's Home, has for its main interest an inva- 
sion of England by a fictitious power which is under- 



360 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

stood, as it is meant to be understood, to represent Ger- 
many. The lesson taught by the play is the danger of 
invasion and the need for every English citizen to be a 
soldier. The Lord Chamberlain licensed this play, but 
refused to license a parody of it. Shortly afterwards he 
refused to license another play in which the fear of a 
German invasion was ridiculed. The German press 
drew the inevitable inference that the Lord Chamberlain 
was an anti-German alarmist, and that his opinions were 
a reflection of those prevailing in St. James's Palace. 
Immediately after this, the Lord Chamberlain licensed 
the play. Whether the inference, as far as the Lord 
Chamberlain was concerned, was justified, is of no con- 
sequence. What is important is that it was sure to be 
made, justly or unjustly, and extended from the Lord 
Chamberlain to the Throne. 



The Objection of Court Etiquet 

There is another objection to the Lord Chamberlain's 
censorship which affects the author's choice of subject. 
Formerly very little heed was given in England to the 
susceptibilities of foreign courts. For instance, the no- 
tion that the Mikado of Japan should be as sacred to the 
English playwright as he is to the Japanese Lord Cham- 
berlain would have seemed grotesque a generation ago. 
Now that the maintenance of entente cordiale between 
nations is one of the most prominent and most useful 
functions of the crown, the freedom of authors to deal 
with political subjects, even historically, is seriously 
threatened by the way in which the censorship makes 
the King responsible for the contents of every play. 
One author — the writer of these lines, in fact — has long 
desired to dramatize the life of Mahomet. But the pos- 
sibility of a protest from the Turkish Ambassador — or 
the fear of it — causing the Lord Chamberlain to refuse 



The Rejected Statement 361 

to license such a play has prevented the play from being 
written. Now^ if the censorship were abolished, nobody 
but the author could be held responsible for the play. 
The Turkish Ambassador does not now protest against 
the publication of Carlyle's essay on the prophet, or of 
the English translations of the Koran in the prefaces to 
which Mahomet is criticized as an impostor, or of the 
older books in which he is reviled as Mahoimd and 
classed with the devil himself. But if these publications 
had to be licensed by the Lord Chamberlain it would be 
impossible for the King to allow the licence to be issued, 
as he would thereby be made responsible for the opinions 
expressed. This restriction of the historical drama is an 
unmixed evil. Great religious leaders are more interest- 
ing and more important subjects for the dramatist than 
great conquerors. It is a misfortune that public opinion 
would not tolerate a dramatization of Mahomet in Con- 
stantinople. But to prohibit it here, where public opin- 
ion would tolerate it, is an absurdity which, if applied in 
all directions, would make it impossible for the Queen to 
receive a Turkish ambassador without veiling herself, 
or the Dean and Chapter of St. Paul's to display a cross 
on the summit of their Cathedral in a city occupied 
largely and influentially by Jews. Court etiquet is no 
doubt an excellent thing for court ceremonies; but 
to attempt to impose it on the drama is about as sensible 
as an attempt to make everybody in London wear court 
dress. 

Why not an Enlightened Censorship? 

In the above cases the general question of censorship 
is separable from the question of the present form of it. 
Every one who condemns the principle of censorship 
must also condemn the Lord Chamberlain's control of 
the drama; but those who approve of the principle do 



362 The ■ Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

not necessarily approve of the Lord Chamberlain being 
the Censor ex officio. They may, however, be entirely 
opposed to popular liberties, and may conclude from 
what has been said, not that the stage should be made as 
free as the church, press, or platform, but that these in- 
stitutions should be censored as strictly as the stage. It 
will seem obvious to them that nothing is needed to re- 
move all objections to a censorship except the placing of 
its powers in better hands. 

Now though the transfer of the censorship to, say, 
the Lord Chancellor, or the Primate, or a Cabinet Min- 
ister, would be much less humiliating to the persons im- 
mediately concerned, the inherent vices of the institution 
would not be appreciably less disastrous. They would 
even be aggravated, for reasons which do not appear on 
the surface, and therefore need to be followed with some 
attention. 

It is often said that the public is the real censor. 
That this is to some extent true is proved by the fact 
that plays which are licensed and produced in London 
have to be expurgated for the provinces. This does not 
mean that the provinces are more strait-laced, but simply 
that in many provincial towns there is only one theatre 
for all classes and all tastes, whereas in London there 
are separate theatres for separate sections of playgoers ; 
so that, for example. Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree can 
conduct His Majesty's Theatre without the slightest re- 
gard to the tastes of the frequenters of the Gaiety The- 
atre; and Mr. George Edwardes can conduct the Gaiety 
Theatre without catering in any way for lovers of Shake- 
spear. Thus the farcical comedy which has scandalized 
the critics in London by the libertinage of its jests is 
played to the respectable dress circle of Northampton 
with these same jests slurred over so as to be imper- 
ceptible by even the most prurient spectator. The pub- 
lic, in short, takes care that nobody shall outrage it. 



The Rejected Statement 363 

But the public also takes care that nobody shall starve 
it, or regulate its dramatic diet as a schoolmistress regu- 
lates the reading of her pupils. Even when it wishes to 
be debauched, no censor can — or at least no censor does 
— stand out against it. If a play is irresistibly amusing, 
it gets licensed no matter what its moral aspect may be. 
A brilliant instance is the Divor9ons of the late Victorien 
Sardou, which may not have been the naughtiest play of 
the 19th century, but was certainly the very naughtiest 
that any English manager in his senses would have ven- 
tured to produce. Nevertheless, being a very amusing 
play, it passed the licenser with the exception of a ref- 
erence to impotence as a ground for divorce which no 
English actress would have ventured on in any case. 
Within the last few months a very amusing comedy with 
a strongly polygamous moral was fomid irresistible by 
the Lord Chamberlain. Plenty of fun and a happy end- 
ing will get anything licensed, because the public will 
have it so, and the Examiner of Plays, as the holder of 
the office testified before the Commission of 1892 (Re- 
port, page 330), feels with the public, and knows that his 
office could not survive a widespread unpopularity. In 
short, the support of the mob — that is, of the unreason- 
ing, unorganized, uninstructed mass of popular senti- 
ment — is indispensable to the censorship as it exists to- 
day in England. This is the explanation of the tol- 
eration by the Lord Chamberlain of coarse and vicious 
plays. It is not long since a judge before whom a 
licensed play came in the course of a lawsuit expressed 
his scandalized astonishment at the licensing of such a 
work. Eminent churchmen have made similar protests. 
In some plays the simulation of criminal assaults on the 
stage has been carried to a point at which a step further 
would have involved the interference of the police. Pro- 
vided the treatment of the theme is gaily or hypocrit- 
ically popular, and the ending happy, the indulgence of 



364 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

the Lord Chamberlain can be counted on. On the other 
hand, anything unpleasing and unpopular is rigorously 
censored. Adultery and prostitution are tolerated and 
even encouraged to such an extent that plays which do 
not deal with them are commonly said not to be plays 
at all. But if any of the unpleasing consequences of 
adultery and prostitution — for instance, an unsuccessful 
illegal operation (successful ones are tolerated) or vene- 
real disease — are mentioned, the play is prohibited. 
This principle of shielding the playgoer from unpleas- 
ant reflections is carried so far that when a play was sub- 
mitted for license in which the relations of a prostitute 
with all the male characters in the piece was described 
as " immoral," the Examiner of Plays objected to that 
passage, though he made no objection to the relations 
themselves. The Lord Chamberlain dare not, in short, 
attempt to exclude from the stage the tragedies of mur- 
der and lust, or the farces of mendacity, adultery, and 
dissolute gaiety in which vulgar people delight. But 
when these same vulgar people are threatened with an 
unpopular play in which dissoluteness is shown to be no 
laughing matter, it is prohibited at once amid the vulgar 
applause, the net result being that vice is made delight- 
ful and virtue banned by the very institution which is 
supported on the understanding that it produces exactly 
the opposite result. 

The Weakness of the Lord Chamberlain's 
Department 

Now comes the question. Why is our censorship, 
armed as it is with apparently autocratic powers, so 
scandalously timid in the face of the mob? Why is it 
not as autocratic in dealing with playwrights below the 
average as with those above it? The answer is that its 
position is really a very weak one. It has no direct co- 



The Rejected Statement 365 

ercive forces, no funds to institute prosecutions and re- 
cover the legal penalties of defying it, no powers of ar- 
rest or imprisonment, in short, none of the guarantees 
of autocracy. What it can do is to refuse to renew the 
licence of a theatre at which its orders are disobeyed. 
When it happens that a theatre is about to be demol- 
ished, as was the case recently with the Imperial Theatre 
after it had passed into the hands of the Wesleyan Meth- 
odists, unlicensed plays can be performed, technically 
in private, but really in full publicity, without risk. 
The prohibited plays of Brieux and Ibsen have been 
performed in London in this way with complete impun- 
ity. But the impunity is not confined to condemned the- 
atres. Not long ago a West End manager allowed a 
prohibited play to be performed at his theatre, taking 
his chance of losing his licence in consequence. The 
event proved that the manager was justified in regarding 
the risk as negligible; for the Lord Chamberlain's rem- 
edy — the closing of a popular and well-conducted the- 
atre — was far too extreme to be practicable. Unless 
the play had so outraged public opinion as to make the 
manager odious and provoke a clamor for his exemplary 
punishment, the Lord Chamberlain could only have had 
his revenge at the risk of having his powers abolished as 
unsupportably tyrannical. 

The Lord Chamberlain then has his powers so adjusted 
that he is tyrannical just where it is important that he 
should be tolerant, and tolerant just where he could 
screw up the standard a little by being tyrannical. His 
plea that there are unmentionable depths to which man- 
agers and authors would descend if he did not prevent 
them is disproved by the plain fact that his indulgence 
goes as far as the police, and sometimes further than 
the public, will let it. If our judges had so little power 
there would be no law in England. If our churches had 
so much, there would be no theatre, no literature, no 



366 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

science, no art, possibly no England, The institution 
is at once absurdly despotic and abjectly weak. 



An Enlightened Censorship still worse 
than the Lord Chamberlain's 

Clearly a censorship of judges, bishops, or statesmen 
would not be in this abject condition. It would no doubt 
make short work of the coarse and vicious pieces which 
now enjoy the protection of the Lord Chamberlain, or at 
least of those of them in which the vulgarity and vice 
are discoverable by merely reading the prompt copy. 
But it would certainly disappoint the main hope of its 
advocates: the hope that it would protect and foster the 
higher drama. It would do nothing of the sort. On 
the contrary, it would inevitably suppress it more com- 
pletely than the Lord Chamberlain does, because it 
would understand it better. The one play of Ibsen's 
which is prohibited on the English stage. Ghosts, is far 
less subversive than A Doll's House. But the Lord 
Chamberlain does not meddle with such far-reaching 
matters as the tendency of a play. He refuses to license 
Ghosts exactly as he wo Id refuse to license Hamlet 
if it were submitted to him as a new play. He would 
license even Hamlet if certain alterations were made in 
it. He would disallow the incestuous relationship be- 
tween the King and Queen. He would probably insist 
on the substitution of some fictitious country for Den- 
mark in deference to the near relations of our reign- 
ing house with that realm. He would certainly make 
it an absolute condition that the closet scene, in which 
a son, in an agony of shame and revulsion, reproaches 
his mother for her relations with his uncle, should be 
struck out as unbearably horrifying and improper. But 
compliance with these conditions would satisfy him. He 



The Rejected Statement 367 

would raise no speculative objections to the tendency of 
the play. 

This indifference to the larger issues of a theatrical 
performance could not be safely predicated of an en- 
lightened censorship. Such a censorship might be more 
liberal in its toleration of matters which are only ob- 
jected to on the ground that they are not usually dis- 
cussed in general social conversation or in the presence 
of children ; but it would presumably have a far deeper 
insight to and concern for the real ethical tendency of 
the play. For instance, had it been in existence during 
the last quarter of a century, it would have perceived 
that those plays of Ibsen's which have been licensed 
without question are fundamentally immoral to an alto- 
gether extraordinary degree. Every one of them is a 
deliberate act of war on society as at present consti- 
tuted. Religion, marriage, ordinary respectability, are 
subjected to a destructive exposure and criticism which 
seems to mere moralists — that is, to persons of no more 
than average depth of mind — to be diabolical. It is no 
exaggeration to say that Ibsen gained his overwhelming 
reputation by imdertaking a task of no less magnitude 
than changing the mind of Europe with the view of 
changing its morals. Now you cannot license work of 
that sort without making yourself responsible for it. 
The Lord Chamberlain accepted the responsibility be- 
cause he did not understand it or concern himself about 
it. But what really enlightened and conscientious official 
da^e take such a responsibility? The strength of char- 
acter and range of vision which made Ibsen capable of 
it are not to be expected from any official, however emi- 
nent. It is true that an enlightened censor might, whilst 
shrinking even with horror from Ibsen's views, perceive 
that any nation which suppressed Ibsen would presently 
find itself falling behind the nations which tolerated him 
just as Spain fell behind England; but the proper action 



368 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

to take on such a conviction is the abdication of censor- 
ship, not the practise of it. As long as a censor is a 
censor, he cannot endorse by his licence opinions which 
seem to him dangerously heretical. 

We may, therefore, conclude that the more enlightened 
a censorship is, the worse it would serve us. The Lord 
Chamberlain, an obviously unenlightened Censor, pro- 
hibits Ghosts and licenses all the rest of Ibsen's plays. 
An enlightened censorship would possibly license Ghosts ; 
but it would certainly suppress many of the other plays. 
It would suppress subversiveness as well as what is 
called bad taste. The Lord Chamberlain prohibits one 
play by Sophocles because, like Hamlet, it mentions the 
subject of incest; but an enlightened censorship might 
suppress all the plays of Euripides because Euripides, 
like Ibsen, was a revolutionary Freethinker. Under the 
Lord Chamberlain, we can smuggle a good deal of im- 
moral drama and almost as much coarsely vulgar and 
furtively lascivious drama as we like. Under a college 
of cardinals, or bishops, or judges, or any other con- 
ceivable form of experts in morals, philosophy, religion, 
or politics, we should get little except stagnant medi- 
ocrity. 

The Practical Impossibilities of 
Censorship 

There is, besides, a crushing material difficulty in the 
way of an enlightened censorship. It is not too much 
to say that the work involved would drive a man of 
any intellectual rank mad. Consider, for example, the 
Christmas pantomimes. Imagine a judge of the High 
Court, or an archbishop, or a Cabinet Minister, or an 
eminent man of letters, earning his living by reading 
through the mass of trivial doggerel represented by all 
the pantomimes which are put into rehearsal simultane- 
ously at the end of every year. The proposal to put 



The Rejected Statement 369 

such mind-destroying drudgery upon an official of the 
class implied by the demand for an enlightened censor- 
ship falls through the moment we realize what it implies 
in practice. 

Another material difficulty is that no play can be 
judged by merely reading the dialogue. To be fully 
effective a censor should witness the performance. The 
mise-en-scene of a play is as much a part of it as the 
words spoken on the stage. No censor could possibly 
object to such a speech as " Might I speak to you for 
a moment, miss " ; yet that apparently innocent phrase 
has often been made offensively improper on the stage 
by popular low comedians, with the effect of changing 
the whole character and meaning of the play as under- 
stood by the official Examiner. In one of the plays of 
the present season, the dialogue was that of a crude 
melodrama dealing in the most conventionally correct 
manner with the fortunes of a good-hearted and virtu- 
ous girl. Its morality was that of the Sunday school. 
But the principal actress, between two speeches which 
contained no reference to her action, changed her under- 
clothing on the stage? It is true that in this case the 
actress was so much better than her part that she suc- 
ceeded in turning what was meant as an impropriety into 
an inoffensive stroke of realism; yet it is none the less 
clear that stage business of this character, on which 
there can be no check except the actual presence of a 
ceiisor in the theatre, might convert any dialogue, how- 
ever innocent, into just the sort of entertainment against 
which the Censor is supposed to protect the public. 

It was this practical impossibility that prevented the 
London County Council from attempting to apply a cen- 
sorship of the Lord Chamberlain's pattern to the Lon- 
don music halls. A proposal to examine all entertain- 
ments before permitting their performance was actually 
made; and it was abandoned, not in the least as contrary 



370 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

to the liberty of the stage, but because the executive 
problem of how to do it at once reduced the proposal to 
absurdity. Even if the Council devoted all its time to 
witnessing rehearsals of variety performances, and put- 
ting each item to the vote, possibly after a prolonged 
discussion followed by a division, the work would still 
fall into arrear. No committee could be induced to un- 
dertake such a task. The attachment of an inspector of 
morals to each music hall would have meant an appre- 
ciable addition to the ratepayers' burden. In the face 
of such difficulties the proposal melted away. Had it 
been pushed through, and the inspectors appointed, each 
of them would have become a censor, and the whole body 
of inspectors would have become a police des mceurs. 
Those who know the history of such police forces on the 
continent will understand how impossible it would be 
to procure inspectors whose characters would stand the 
strain of their opportunities of corruption, both pecu- 
niary and personal, at such salaries as a local authority 
could be persuaded to offer. 

It has been suggested that the present censorship 
should be supplemented by a board of experts, who 
should deal, not with the whole mass of plays sent up 
for license, but only those which the Examiner of Plays 
refuses to pass. As the number of plays which the Ex- 
aminer refuses to pass is never great enough to occupy 
a Board in permanent session with regular salaries, and 
as casual employment is not compatible with public re- 
sponsibility, this proposal would work out in practice as 
an addition to the duties of some existing functionary. 
A Secretary of State would be objectionable as likely to 
be biased politically. An ecclesiastical referee might be 
biassed against the theatre altogether. A judge in cham- 
bers would be the proper authority. This plan would 
combine the inevitable intolerance of an enlightened cen- 
sorship with the popular laxity of the Lord Chamberlain. 



The Rejected Statement 371 

The judge would suppress the pioneers, whilst the Ex- 
aminer of Plays issued two guinea certificates for the 
vulgar and vicious plays. For this reason the plan 
would no doubt be popular; but it would be very much 
as a relaxation of the administration of the Public 
Health Acts accompanied by the cheapening of gin 
would be popular. 

The Arbitration Proposal 

On the occasion of a recent deputation of playwrights 
to the Prime Minister it was suggested that if a cen- 
sorship be inevitable, provision should be made for an 
appeal from the Lord Chamberlain in cases of refusal of 
licence. The authors of this suggestion propose that the 
Lord Chamberlain shall choose one umpire and the au- 
thor another. The two umpires shall then elect a ref- 
eree, whose decision shall be final. 

This proposal is not likely to be entertained by con- 
stitutional lawyers. It is a naive offer to accept the 
method of arbitration in what is essentially a matter, not 
between one private individual or body and another, but 
between a public offender and the State. It will presum- 
ably be ruled out as a proposal to refer a case of man- 
slaughter to arbitration would be ruled out. But even 
if it were constitutionally sound, it bears all the marks 
of that practical inexperience which leads men to believe 
that arbitration either costs nothing or is at least cheaper 
than law. Who is to pay for the time of the three arbi- 
trators, presumably men of high professional standing.^ 
The author may not be able: the manager may not be 
willing: neither of them should be called upon to pay 
for a public service otherwise than by their contributions 
to the revenue. Clearly the State should pay. But even 
so, the difficulties are only beginning. A licence is sel- 
dom refused except on grounds which are controversial. 



372 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

The two arbitrators selected by the opposed parties to 
the controversy are to agree to leave the decision to a 
third party unanimously chosen by themselves. That is 
very far from being a simple solution. An attempt to 
shorten and simplify the passing of the Finance Bill by 
referring it to an arbitrator chosen unanimously by Mr. 
Asquith and Mr. Balfour might not improbably cost 
more and last longer than a civil war. And why should 
the chosen referee — if he ever succeeded in getting 
chosen — be assumed to be a safer authority than the 
Examiner of Plays.'' He would certainly be a less re- 
sponsible one : in fact, being (however eminent) a casual 
person called in to settle a single case, he would be vir- 
tually irresponsible. Worse still, he would take all re- 
sponsibility away from the Lord Chamberlain, who is at 
least an official of the King's Household and a nominee 
of the Government. The Lord Chamberlain, with all his 
shortcomings, thinks twice before he refuses a licence, 
knowing that his refusal is final and may promptly be 
made public. But if he could transfer his responsibility 
to an arbitrator, he would naturally do so whenever he 
felt the slightest misgiving, or whenever, for diplomatic 
reasons, the licence would come more gracefully from an 
authority imconnected with the court. These considera- 
tions, added to the general objection to the principle of 
censorship, seem sufficient to put the arbitration expedi- 
ent quite out of the question. 



End of the First Part op The Rejected Statement. 



THE REJECTED STATEMENT 

Part II 

THE LICENSING OF THEATRES 

The Distinction between Licensing and 
Censorship 

It must not be concluded that the uncompromising aboli- 
tion of all censorship involves the abandonment of all 
control and regulation of theatres. Factories are regu- 
lated in the public interest ; but there is no censorship of 
factories. For example, many persons are sincerely con- 
vinced that cotton clothing is unhealthy; that alcoholic 
drinks are demoralizing; and that playing-cards are the 
devil's picture-books. But though the factories in which 
cotton, whiskey, and cards are manufactured are strin- 
gently regulated under the factory code and the Public 
Health and Building Acts, the inspectors appointed to 
carry out these Acts never go to a manufacturer and in- 
form him that unless he manufactures woollens instead 
of cottons, ginger-beer instead of whiskey. Bibles instead 
of playing-cards, he will be forbidden to place his prod- 
ucts on the market. In the case of premises licensed 
for the sale of spirits the authorities go a step further. 
A public-house differs from a factory in the essential 
particular that whereas disorder in a factory is promptly 
and voluntarily suppressed, because every moment of its 
duration involves a measurable pecuniary loss to the pro- 
prietor, disorder in a public-house may be a source of 
profit to the proprietor by its attraction for disorderly 
customers. Consequently a publican is compelled to ob- 
tain a licence to pursue his trade; and this licence lasts 

373 



374 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

only a year, and need not be renewed if his house has 
been conducted in a disorderly manner in the meantime. 

Prostitution and Drink in Theatres 

The theatre presents the same problem as the public- 
house in respect to disorder. To begin with, a theatre is 
actually a place licensed for the sale of spirits. The 
bars at a London theatre can be let without difficulty for 
£30 a week and upwards. And though it is clear that 
nobody will pay from a shilling to half a guinea for 
access to a theatre bar when he can obtain access to an 
ordinary public-house for nothing, there is no law to 
prevent the theatre proprietor from issuing free passes 
broadcast and recouping himself by the profit on the 
sale of drink. Besides, there may be some other attrac- 
tion than the sale of drink. When this attraction is that 
of the play no objection need be made. But it happens 
that the auditorium of a theatre, with its brilliant light- 
ing and luxurious decorations, makes a very effective 
shelter and background for the display of fine dresses 
and pretty faces. Consequently theatres have been used 
for centuries in England as markets by prostitutes. 
From the Restoration to the days of Macready all the- 
atres were made use of in this way as a matter of course ; 
and to this, far more than to any prejudice against 
dramatic art, we owe the Puritan formula that the theatre 
door is the gate of hell. Macready had a hard struggle 
to drive the prostitutes from his theatre; and since his 
time the London theatres controlled by the Lord Cham- 
berlain have become respectable and even socially pre- 
tentious. But some of the variety theatres still derive a 
revenue by selling admissions to women who do not look 
at the performance, and men who go to purchase or 
admire the women. And in the provinces this state of 
things is by no means confined to the variety theatres. 



The Rejected Statement 375 

The real attraction is sometimes not the performance at 
all. The theatre is not really a theatre: it is a drink 
shop and a prostitution market; and the last shred of its 
disguise is stripped by the virtually indiscriminate issue 
of free tickets to the men. Access to the stage is so 
easily obtained; and the plays preferred by the man- 
agement are those in which the stage is filled with young 
women who are not in any serious technical sense of the 
word actresses at all. Considering that all this is now 
possible at any theatre, and actually occurs at some the- 
atres, the fact that our best theatres are as respectable 
as they are is much to their credit; but it is still an 
intolerable evil that respectable managers should have to 
fight against the free tickets and disorderly housekeep- 
ing of unscrupulous competitors. The dramatic author 
is equally injured. He finds that unless he writes plays 
which make suitable sideshows for drinking-bars and 
brothels, he may be excluded from towns where there 
is not room for two theatres, and where the one exist- 
ing theatre is exploiting drunkenness and prostitution 
instead of carrying on a legitimate dramatic business. 
Indeed everybody connected with the theatrical profes- 
sion suffers in reputation from the detestable tradition of 
such places, against which the censorship has proved 
quite useless. 

Here we have a strong case for applying either the 
licensing system or whatever better means may be de- 
vized for securing the orderly conduct of houses of 
public entertainment, dramatic or other. Liberty must, 
no doubt, be respected in so far that no manager should 
have the right to refuse admission to decently dressed, 
sober, and well-conducted persons, whether they are 
prostitutes, soldiers in imiform, gentlemen not in evening 
dress, Indians, or what not; but when disorder is 
stopped, disorderly persons will either cease to come or 
else reform their manners. It is, however, quite argu- 



376 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

able that the indiscriminate issue of free admissions, 
though an apparently innocent and good-natured, and 
certainly a highly popular proceeding, should expose the 
proprietor of the theatre to the risk of a refusal to renew 
his licence. 

Why the Managers dread Local Control 

All this points to the transfer of the control of the- 
atres from the Lord Chamberlain to the municipality. 
And this step is opposed by the long-run managers, 
partly because they take it for granted that municipal 
control must involve municipal censorship of plays, so 
that plays might be licensed in one town and prohibited 
in the next, and partly because, as they have no desire 
to produce plays which are in advance of public opinion, 
and as the Lord Chamberlain in every other respect 
gives more scandal by his laxity than trouble by his 
severity, they find in the present system a cheap and 
easy means of procuring a certificate which relieves them 
of all social responsibility, and provides them with so 
strong a weapon of defence in case of a prosecution that 
it acts in practice as a bar to any such proceedings. 
Above all, they know that the Examiner of Plays is free 
from the pressure of that large body of English public 
opinion already alluded to, which regards the theatre as 
the Prohibitionist Teetotaller regards the public-house: 
that is, as an abomination to be stamped out uncondi- 
tionally. The managers rightly dread this pressure 
more than anything else; and they believe that it is so 
strong in local governments as to be a characteristic bias 
of municipal authority. In this they are no doubt mis- 
taken. There is not a municipal authority of any im- 
portance in the country in which a proposal to stamp 
out the theatre, or even to treat it illiberally, would have 
a chance of adoption. Municipal control of the variety 



The Rejected Statement 377 

theatres (formerly called music halls) has been very 
far from liberal, except in the one particular in which 
the Lord Chamberlain is equally illiberal. That par- 
ticular is the assumption that a draped figure is decent 
and an undraped one indecent. It is useless to point to 
actual experience, which proves abundantly that naked 
or apparently naked figures, whether exhibited as living 
pictures, animated statuary, or in a dance, are at their 
best not only innocent, but refining in their effect, where- 
as those actresses and skirt dancers who have brought 
the peculiar aphrodisiac effect which is objected to to 
the highest pitch of efficiency wear twice as many petti- 
coats as an ordinary lady does, and seldom exhibit more 
than their ankles. Unfortunately, municipal councillors 
persist in confusing decency with drapery ; and both in 
London and the provinces certain positively edifying 
performances have been forbidden or withdrawn under 
pressure, and replaced by coarse and vicious ones. 
There is not the slightest reason to suppose that the 
Lord Chamberlain would have been any more tolerant; 
but this does not alter the fact that the municipal licens- 
ing authorities have actually used their powers to set up 
a censorship which is open to all the objections to cen- 
sorship in general, and which, in addition, sets up the 
objection from which central control is free: namely, the 
impossibility of planning theatrical tours without the 
serious commercial risk of having the performance for- 
bidden in some of the towns booked. How can this be 
prevented ? 

Desirable Limitations of Local Control 

The problem is not a difficult one. The municipality 
can be limited just as the monarchy is limited. The Act 
transferring theatres to local control can be a charter 
of the liberties of the stage as well as an Act to reform 



o78 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

administration. The power to refuse to grant or renew 
a licence to a theatre need not be an arbitrary one. The 
municipality may be required to state the ground of re- 
fusal; and certain grounds can be expressly declared 
as unlawful; so that it shall be possible for the manager 
to resort to the courts for a mandamus to compel the 
authority to grant a licence. It can be declared unlaw- 
ful for a licensing authority to demand from the man- 
ager any disclosure of the nature of any entertainment 
he proposes to give, or to prevent its performance, or to 
refuse to renew his licence on the ground that the tend- 
ency of his entertainments is contrary to religion and 
morals, or that the theatre is an undesirable institution, 
or that there are already as many theatres as are needed, 
or that the theatre draws people away from the churches, 
chapels, mission halls, and the like in its neighborhood. 
The assumption should be that every citizen has a right 
to open and conduct a theatre, and therefore has a right 
to a licence unless he has forfeited that right by allow- 
ing his theatre to become a disorderly house, or failing 
to provide a building which complies with the regula- 
tions concerning sanitation and egress in case of fire, 
or being convicted of an offence against public decency. 
Also, the licensing powers of the authority should not 
be delegated to any official or committee; and the man- 
ager or lessee of the theatre should have a right to ap- 
pear in person or by counsel to plead against any motion 
to refuse to grant or renew his licence. With these safe- 
guards the licensing power could not be stretched to cen- 
sorship. The manager would enjoy liberty of conscience 
as far as the local authority is concerned; but on the 
least attempt on his part to keep a disorderly house 
under cover of opening a theatre he would risk his 
licence. 

But the managers will not and should not be satisfied 
with these limits to the municipal power. If they are 



The Rejected Statement 379 

deprived of the protection of the Lord Chamberlain's 
licence, and at the same time efficiently protected against 
every attempt at censorship by the licensing authority, 
the enemies of the theatre will resort to the ordinary 
law, and try to get from the prejudices of a jury what 
they are debarred from getting from the prejudices of 
a County Council or City Corporation. Moral Reform 
Societies, " Purity " Societies, Vigilance Societies, exist 
in England and America for the purpose of enforcing 
the existing laws against obscenity, blasphemy. Sabbath- 
breaking, the debauchery of children, prostitution and so 
forth. The paid officials of these societies, in their 
anxiety to produce plenty of evidence of their activity 
in the annual reports which go out to the subscribers, do 
not always discriminate between an obscene postcard and 
an artistic one, or to put it more exactly, between a 
naked figure and an indecent one. They often combine 
a narrow but terribly sincere sectarian bigotry with a 
complete ignorance of art and history. Even when they 
have some culture, their livelihood is at the mercy of 
subscribers and committee men who have none. If these 
officials had any power of distinguishing between art and 
blackguardism, between morality and virtue, between im- 
morality and vice, between conscientious heresy and mere 
baseness of mind and foulness of mouth, they might be 
trusted by theatrical managers not to abuse the pow- 
ers of the common informer. As it is, it has been found 
necessary, in order to enable good music to be performed 
on Sunday, to take away these powers in that particular, 
and vest them solely in the Attorney-General. This 
disqualification of the common informer should be ex- 
tended to the initiation of all proceedings of a censorial 
character against theatres. Few people are aware of the 
monstrous laws against blasphemy which still disgrace 
our statute book. If any serious attempt were made to 
carry them out, prison accommodation would have to be 



380 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

provided for almost every educated person in the coun- 
try, beginning with the Archbishop of Canterbury. Un- 
til some government with courage and character enough 
to repeal them comes into power, it is not too much to 
ask that such infamous powers of oppression should be 
kept in responsible hands and not left at the disposal 
of every bigot ignorant enough to be unaware of the 
social dangers of persecution. Besides, the common in- 
former is not always a sincere bigot, who believes he is 
performing an action of signal merit in silencing and 
ruining a heretic. He is unfortunately just as often a 
blackmailer, who has studied his powers as a common 
informer in order that he may extort money for refrain- 
ing from exercising them. If the manager is to be re- 
sponsible he should be made responsible to a responsi- 
ble functionary. To be responsible to every fanatical 
ignoramus who chooses to prosecute him for exhibiting a 
cast of the Hermes of Praxiteles in his vestibule, or giv- 
ing a performance of ]\Ieasure for Measure, is mere slav- 
ery. It is made bearable at present by the protection 
of the Lord Chamberlain's certificate. But when that is 
no longer available, the common informer must be dis- 
armed if the manager is to enjoy security. 



SUMMARY 



The general case against censorship as a principle, 
and the particular case against the existing English cen- 
sorship and against its replacement by a more enlight- 
ened one, is now complete. The following is a recapitu- 
lation of the propositions and conclusions contended for. 

1. The question of censorship or no censorship is a 
question of high political principle and not of petty 
policy. 

2. The toleration of heresy and shocks to morality on 
the stage, and even their protection against the preju- 
dices and superstitions which necessarily enter largely 
into morality and public opinion, are essential to the 
welfare of the nation. 

3. The existing censorship of the Lord Chamberlain 
does not only intentionally suppress heresy and chal- 
lenges to morality in their serious and avowed forms, but 
unintentionally gives the special protection of its official 
licence to the most extreme impropriety that the lowest 
section of London playgoers will tolerate in theatres es- 
pecially devoted to their entertainment, licensing every- 
thing that is popular and forbidding any attempt to 
change public opinion or morals. 

4. The Lord Chamberlain's censorship is open to the 
special objection that its application to political plays is 
taken to indicate the attitude of the Crown on questions 
of domestic and foreign policy, and that it imposes the 
limits of etiquet on the historical drama. 

5. A censorship of a more enlightened and independ- 

381 



382 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

ent kind, exercised by the most eminent available author- 
ities, would prove in practice more disastrous than the 
censorship of the Lord Chamberlain, because the more 
eminent its members were the less possible it would be 
for them to accept the responsibility for heresy or im- 
morality by licensing them, and because the many heret- 
ical and immoral plays which now pass the Lord Cham- 
berlain because he does not understand them, would be 
understood and suppressed by a more highly enlightened 
censorship. 

6. A reconstructed and enlightened censorship would 
be armed with summary and effective powers which 
would stop the evasions by which heretical and immoral 
plays are now performed in spite of the Lord Chamber- 
lain; and such powers would constitute a tyranny which 
would ruin the theatre spiritually by driving all inde- 
pendent thinkers from the drama into the uncensored 
forms of art. 

7. The work of critically examining all stage plays 
in their written form, and of witnessing their perform- 
ance in order to see that the sense is not altered by 
the stage business, would, even if it were divided 
among so many officials as to be physically possible, 
be mentally impossible to persons of taste and en- 
lightenment. 

8. Regulation of theatres is an entirely different mat- 
ter from censorship, inasmuch as a theatre, being not 
only a stage, but a place licensed for the sale of spirits, 
and a public resort capable of being put to disorderly 
use, and needing special provision for the safety of au- 
diences in cases of fire, etc., cannot be abandoned wholly 
to private control, and may therefore reasonably be made 
subject to an annual licence like those now required be- 
fore allowing premises to be used publicly for music and 
dancing. 

9. In order to prevent the powers of the licensing au- 



The Rejected Statement 383 

thority being abused so as to constitute a virtual cen- 
sorship, any Act transferring the theatres to the control 
of a licensing authority should be made also a charter 
of the rights of dramatic authors and managers by the 
following provisions: 

A. The public prosecutor (the Attorney-General) 
alone should have the right to set the law in operation 
against the manager of a theatre or the author of a 
play in respect of the character of the play or enter- 
tainment. 

B. No disclosure of the particulars of a theatrical en- 
tertainment shall be required before performance. 

C. Licences shall not be withheld on the ground that 
the existence of theatres is dangerous to religion and 
morals, or on the ground that any entertainment given 
or contemplated is heretical or immoral. 

D. The licensing area shall be no less than that of a 
County Council or City Corporation, which shall not del- 
egate its licensing powers to any minor local authority 
or to any official or committee; it shall decide all ques- 
tions affecting the existence of a theatrical licence by 
vote of the entire body; managers, lessees, and proprie- 
tors of theatres shall have the right to plead, in person 
or by counsel, against a proposal to withhold a licence; 
and the licence shall not be withheld except for stated 
reasons, the validity of which shall be subject to the 
judgment of the high courts. 

E. The annual licence, once granted, shall not be can- 
celled or suspended unless the manager has been con- 
victed by public prosecution of an offence against the 
ordinary laws against disorderly housekeeping, inde- 
cency, blasphemy, etc., except in cases where some 
structural or sanitary defect in the building necessitates 
immediate action for the protection of the public against 
physical injury. 

F. No licence shall be refused on the ground that 



384 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

the proximity of the theatre to a church, mission hall, 
school, or other place of worship, edification, instruc- 
tion, or entertainment (including another theatre) would 
draw the public away from such places into its own 
doors. 



PREFACE RESUMED 



Mr. George Alexander's Protest 

On the facts mentioned in the foregoing statement^ and 
in my evidence before the Joint Select Committee, no 
controversy arose except on one point. Mr. George 
Alexander protested vigorously and indignantly against 
my admission that theatres, like public-houses, need spe- 
cial control on the ground that they can profit by dis- 
order, and are sometimes conducted with that end in 
view. Now, Mr. Alexander is a famous actor-manager; 
and it is very difficult to persuade the public that the 
more famous an actor-manager is the less he is likely 
to know about any theatre except his own. When the 
Committee of 1892 reported, I was considered guilty of 
a perverse paradox when I said that the witness who 
knew least about the theatre was Henry Irving. Yet a 
moment's consideration would have shown that the para- 
dox was a platitude. For about quarter of a century 
Irving was confined night after night to his own theatre 
and his own dressing-room, never seeing a play even 
there because he was himself part of the play; producing 
the works of long-departed authors; and, to the extent 
to which his talent was extraordinary, necessarily mak- 
ing his theatre unlike any other theatre. When he went 
to the provinces or to America, the theatres to which he 
went were swept and garnished for him, and their staffs 
replaced — as far as he came in contact with them — by 
his own lieutenants. In the end, there was hardly a 

385 



386 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

first-nighter in his gallery who did not know more about 
the London theatres and the progress of dramatic art 
than he; and as to the provinces, if any chief constable 
had told him the real history and character of many 
provincial theatres, he would have denounced that chief 
constable as an ignorant libeller of a noble profession. 
But the constable would have been right for all that. 
Now if this was true of Sir Henry Irving, who did not 
become a London manager imtil he had roughed it for 
years in the provinces, how much more true must it be 
of, say, Mr. George Alexander, whose successful march 
through his profession has passed as far from the pur- 
lieus of our theatrical world as the king's naval career 
from the Isle of Dogs.'' The moment we come to that 
necessary part of the censorship question which deals 
with the control of theatres from the point of view of 
those who know how much money can be made out of 
them by managers who seek to make the auditorium at- 
tractive rather than the stage, you find the managers 
divided into two sections. The first section consists of 
honorable and successful managers like Mr. Alexander, 
who know nothing of such abuses, and deny, with per- 
fect sincerity and indignant vehemence, that they exist 
except, perhaps, in certain notorious variety theatres. 
The other is the silent section which knows better, but 
is very well content to be publicly defended and pri- 
vately amused by Mr. Alexander's innocence. To accept 
a West End manager as an expert in theatres because he 
is an actor is much as if we were to accept the organist 
of St. Paul's Cathedral as an expert on music halls be- 
cause he is a musician. The real experts are all in the 
conspiracy to keep the police out of the theatre. And 
they are so successful that even the police do not know 
as much as they should. 

The police should have been examined by the Com- 
mittee, and the whole question of the extent to which 



Preface 387 

theatres are disorderly houses in disguise sifted to the 
bottom. For it is on this point that we discover behind 
the phantoms of the corrupt dramatists who are re- 
strained by the censorship from debauching the stage, the 
reality of the corrupt managers and theatre proprietors 
who actually do debauch it without let or hindrance from 
the censorship. The whole case for giving control over 
theatres to local authorities rests on this reality. 

Eliza and Her Bath 

The persistent notion that a theatre is an Alsatia 
where the king's writ does not run, and where any wick- 
edness is possible in the absence of a special tribunal 
and a special police, was brought out by an innocent re- 
mark made by Sir William Gilbert, who, when giving 
evidence before the Committee, was asked by Colonel 
Lockwood whether a law sufficient to restrain impropri- 
ety in books would also restrain impropriety in plays. 
Sir William replied: " I should say there is a very wide 
distinction between what is read and what is seen. In a 
novel one may read that ' Eliza stripped off her dress- 
ing-gown and stepped into her bath ' without any harm ; 
but I think if that were presented on the stage it would 
be shocking." All the stupid and inconsiderate people 
seized eagerly on this illustration as if it were a suc- 
cessful attempt to prove that without a censorship we 
should be unable to prevent actresses from appearing 
naked on the stage. As a matter of fact, if an actress 
could be persuaded to do such a thing (and it would be 
about as easy to persuade a bishop's wife to appear in 
church in the same condition) the police would simply 
arrest her on a charge of indecent exposure. The extent 
to which this obvious safeguard was overlooked may be 
taken as a measure of the thoughtlessness and frivolity 
of the excuses made for the censorship. It should be 



388 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

added that the artistic representation of a bath, with 
every suggestion of nakedness that the law as to decency 
allows, is one of the most familiar subjects of scenic art. 
From the Rhine maidens in Wagner's Trilogy, and the 
bathers in the second act of Les Huguenots, to the bal- 
lets of water nymphs in our Christmas pantomimes and 
at our variety theatres, the sound hygienic propaganda 
of the bath, and the charm of the undraped human fig- 
ure, are exploited without offence on the stage to an 
extent never dreamt of by any novelist. 

A King's Proctor 

Another hare was started by Professor Gilbert Mur- 
ray and Mr. Laurence Housman, who, in pure kindness 
to the managers, asked whether it would not be possible 
to establish for their assistance a sort of King's Proctor 
to whom plays might be referred for an oflScial legal 
opinion as to their compliance with the law before pro- 
duction. There are several objections to this proposal; 
and they may as well be stated in case the proposal 
should be revived. In the first place, no lawyer with the 
most elementary knowledge of the law of libel in its vari- 
ous applications to sedition, obscenity, and blasphemy, 
could answer for the consequences of producing any play 
whatsoever as to which the smallest question could arise 
in the mind of any sane person. I have been a critic 
and an author in active service for thirty years; and 
though nothing I have written has ever been prosecuted 
in England or made the subject of legal proceedings, yet 
I have never published in my life an article, a play, or 
a book, as to which, if I had taken legal advice, an 
expert could have assured me that I was proof against 
prosecution or against an action for damages by the per- 
sons criticized. No doubt a sensible solicitor might have 
advised me that the risk was no greater than all men 



Preface 389 

have to take in dangerous trades; but such an opinion, 
though it may encourage a client, does not protect him. 
For example, if a publisher asks his solicitor whether 
he may venture on an edition of Sterne's Sentimental 
Journey, or a manager whether he may produce King 
Lear without risk of prosecution, the solicitor will ad- 
vise him to go ahead. But if the solicitor or counsel 
consulted by him were asked for a guarantee that neither 
of these works was a libel, he would have to reply that 
he could give no such guarantee; that, on the contrary, 
it was his duty to warn his client that both of them are 
obscene libels; that King Lear, containing as it does 
perhaps the most appalling blasphemy that despair ever 
uttered, is a blasphemous libel, and that it is doubtful 
whether it could not be construed as a seditious libel 
as well. As to Ibsen's Brand (the play which made him 
popular with the most earnestly religious people) no 
sane solicitor would advise his client even to chance it 
except in a broadly cultivated and tolerant (or indiffer- 
ent) modern city. The lighter plays would be no bet- 
ter off. Wliat lawyer could accept any responsibility 
for the production of Sardou's Divor9ons or Clyde 
Fitch's The Woman in the Case? Put the proposed 
King's Proctor in operation to-morrow; and what will 
be the result? The managers will find that instead of 
insuring them as the Lord Chamberlain does, he will 
warn them that every play they submit to him is vul- 
nerable to the law, and that they must produce it not 
only on the ordinary risk of acting on their own respon- 
sibility, but at the very grave additional risk of doing 
so in the teeth of an official warning. Under such cir- 
cumstances, what manager would resort a second time 
to the Proctor; and how would the Proctor live without 
fees, unless indeed the Government gave him a salary 
for doing nothing? The institution would not last a 
year, except as a job for somebody. 



390 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Counsel's Opinion 

The proposal is still less plausible when it is consid- 
ered that at present, without any new legislation at all, 
any manager who is doubtful about a play can obtain 
the advice of his solicitor, or Counsel's opinion, if he 
thinks it will be of any service to him. The verdict of 
the proposed King's Proctor would be nothing but Coun- 
sel's opinion without the liberty of choice of coun- 
sel, possibly cheapened, but sure to be adverse; for an 
official cannot give practical advice as a friend and a 
man of the world : he must stick to the letter of the law 
and take no chances. And as far as the law is con- 
cerned, journalism, literature, and the drama exist only 
by custom or sufferance. 

Wanted: A New Magna Charta 

This leads us to a very vital question. Is it not pos- 
sible to amend the law so as to make it possible for a 
lawyer to advise his client that he may publish the 
works of Blake, Zola, and Swinburne, or produce the 
plays of Ibsen and Mr. Granville Barker, or print an 
ordinary criticism in his newspaper, without the possi- 
bility of finding himself in prison, or mulcted in dam- 
ages and costs in consequence? No doubt it is; but only 
by a declaration of constitutional right to blaspheme, 
rebel, and deal with tabooed subjects. Such a declara- 
tion is not just now within the scope of practical politics, 
although we are compelled to act to a great extent as if 
it was actually part of the constitution. All that can 
be done is to take my advice and limit the necessary 
public control of the theatres in such a manner as to 
prevent its being abused as a censorship. We have ready 
to our hand the machinery of licensing as applied to 
public-houses. A licensed victualler can now be assured 



Preface 391 

confidently by his lawyer that a magistrate cannot refuse 
to renew his licence on the ground that he (the magis- 
trate) is a teetotaller and has seen too much of the evil 
of drink to sanction its sale. The magistrate must give 
a judicial reason for his refusal, meaning really a con- 
stitutional reason; and his teetotalism is not such a rea- 
son. In the same way you can protect a theatrical man- 
ager by ruling out certain reasons as unconstitutional, as 
suggested in my statement. Combine this with the abo- 
lition of the common informer's power to initiate pro- 
ceedings, and you will have gone as far as seems pos- 
sible at present. You will have local control of the 
theatres for police purposes and sanitary purposes with- 
out censorship; and I do not see what more is possible 
until we get a formal Magna Charta declaring all the 
categories of libel and the blasphemy laws contrary to 
public liberty, and repealing and defining accordingly. 

Proposed: A New Star Chamber 

Yet we cannot mention Magna Charta without recall- 
ing how useless such documents are to a nation which 
has no more political comprehension nor political virtue 
than King John. When Henry VII. calmly proceeded 
to tear up Magna Charta by establishing the Star Cham- 
ber (a criminal court consisting of a committee of the 
Privy Council without a jury) nobody objected until, 
about a century and a half later, the Star Cham- 
ber began cutting off the ears of eminent XVII. cen- 
tury Nonconformists and standing them in the pillory; 
and then the Nonconformists, and nobody else, abol- 
ished the Star Chamber. And if anyone doubts that 
we are quite ready to establish the Star Chamber again, 
let him read the Report of the Joint Select Com- 
mittee, on which I now venture to offer a few criticisms. 

The report of the Committee, which will be found in 



392 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

the bluebook, should be read with attention and respect 
as far as page x., up to which point it is an able and 
well-written statement of the case. From page x. on- 
ward, when it goes on from diagnosing the disease to 
prescribing the treatment, it should be read with even 
greater attention but with no respect whatever, as the 
main object of the treatment is to conciliate the How 
Not To Do It majority. It containSj however, one very 
notable proposal, the same being nothing more or less 
than to revive the Star Chamber for the purpose of 
dealing with heretical or seditious plays and their au- 
thors, and indeed with all charges against theatrical en- 
tertainments except common police cases of indecency. 
The reason given is that for which the Star Chamber 
was created by Henry VII: that is, the inadequacy of 
the ordinary law. " We consider," says the report, 
" that the law which prevents or punishes indecency, 
blasphemy and libel in printed publications [it does not, 
by the way, except in the crudest police cases] would 
not be adequate for the control of the drama." There- 
fore a committee of the Privy Council is to be empow- 
ered to suppress plays and punish managers and authors 
at its pleasure, on the motion of the Attorney-General, 
without a jury. The members of the Committee will, 
of course, be men of high standing and character: other- 
wise they would not be on the Privy Council. That is 
to say, they will have all the qualifications of Archbishop 
Laud. 

Now I have no guarantee that any member of the ma- 
jority of the Joint Select Committee ever heard of the 
Star Chamber or of Archbishop Laud. One of them did 
not know that politics meant anything more than party 
electioneering. Nothing is more alarming than the ig- 
norance of our public men of tlie commonplaces of our 
history, and their consequent readiness to repeat experi- 
ments which have in the past produced national catas- 



Preface 393 

trophes. At all events, whether they knew what they 
were doing or not, there can be no question as to what 
they did. They proposed virtually that the Act of the 
Long Parliament in 1641 shall be repealed, and the 
Star Chamber re-established, in order that playwrights 
and managers may be punished for unspecified offences 
unknown to the law. When I say unspecified, I should 
say specified as follows (see page xi. of the report) in 
the case of a play. 

(a) To be indecent. 

(6) To contain offensive personalities. 

(c) To represent on the stage in an invidious manner 
a living person, or any person recently dead. 

(d) To do violence to the sentiment of religious rev- 
erence. 

(e) To be calculated to conduce to vice or crime. 

(/) To be calculated to impair friendly relations with 
any foreign power. 

(^g) To be calculated to cause a breach of the peace. 

Now it is clear that there is no play yet written, or 
possible to be written, in this world, that might not be 
condemned under one or other of these heads. How any 
sane man, not being a professed enemy of public liberty, 
could put his hand to so monstrous a catalogue passes 
my understanding. Had a comparatively definite and 
innocent clause been added forbidding the affirmation or 
denial of the doctrine of Transubstantiation, the country 
would have been up in arms at once. Lord Ribblesdale 
made an effort to reduce the seven categories to the old 
formula " not to be fitting for the preservation of good 
manners, decorum, or the public peace " ; but this pro- 
posal was not carried; whilst on Lord Gorell's motion 
a final widening of the net was achieved by adding the 
phrase " to be calculated to " ; so that even if a play 



394 The Shewlng-Up of Blanco Posnet 

does not produce any of the results feared, the author 
can still be punished on the ground that his play is " cal- 
culated " to produce them. I have no hesitation in say- 
ing that a committee capable of such an outrageous dis- 
play of thoughtlessness and historical ignorance as this 
paragraph of its report implies deserves to be haled be- 
fore the tribunal it has itself proposed, and dealt with 
under a general clause levelled at conduct " calculated 
to " overthrow the liberties of England. 

Possibilities of the Proposal 

Still, though I am certainly not willing to give Lord 
Gorell the chance of seeing me in the pillory with my 
ears cut off if I can help it, I daresay many authors 
would rather take their chance with a Star Chamber 
than with a jury, just as some soldiers would rather take 
their chance with a court-martial than at Quarter Ses- 
sions. For that matter, some of them would rather take 
their chance with the Lord Chamberlain than with either. 
And though this is no reason for depriving the whole 
body of authors of the benefit of Magna Charta, still, 
if the right of the proprietor of a play to refuse the 
good offices of the Privy Council and to perform the play 
until his accusers had indicted him at law, and obtained 
the verdict of a jury against him, were sufficiently 
guarded, the proposed committee might be set up and 
used for certain purposes. For instance, it might be 
made a condition of the intervention of the Attorney- 
General or the Director of Public Prosecutions that he 
should refer an accused play to the committee, and obtain 
their sanction before taking action, offering the propri- 
etor of the play, if the Committee thought fit, an op- 
portunity of voluntarily accepting trial by the Committee 
as an alternative to prosecution in the ordinary course 
of law. But the Committee should have no powers of 



Preface 395 

punishment beyond the power (formidable enough) of 
suspending performances of the play. If it thought that 
additional punishment was called for, it could order a 
prosecution without allowing the proprietor or author 
of the play the alternative of a trial by itself. The au- 
thor of the play should be made a party to all proceed- 
ings of the Committee, and have the right to defend 
himself in person or by counsel. This would provide a 
check on the Attorney-General (who might be as bigoted 
as any of the municipal aldermen who are so much 
dreaded by the actor-managers) without enabling the 
Committee to abuse its powers for party, class, or sec- 
tarian ends beyond that irreducible minimum of abuse 
which a popular jury would endorse, for which minimum 
there is no remedy. 

But when everything is said for the Star Chamber 
that can be said, and every precaution taken to secure to 
those whom it pursues the alternative of trial by jury, 
the expedient still remains a very questionable one, to be 
endured for the sake of its protective rather than its 
repressive powers. It should abolish the present quaint 
toleration of rioting in theatres. For example, if it is 
to be an offence to perform a play which the proposed 
new Committee shall condemn, it should also be made an 
offence to disturb a performance which the Committee 
has not condemned. " Brawling " at a theatre should be 
dealt with as severely as brawling in church if the cen- 
sorship is to be taken out of the hands of the public. At 
present Jenny Geddes may throw her stool at the head 
of a playwright who preaches unpalatable doctrine to 
her, or rather, since her stool is a fixture, she may hiss 
and hoot and make it impossible to proceed with the 
performance, even although nobody has compelled her to 
come to the theatre or suspended her liberty to stay 
away, and although she has no claim on an imendowed 
theatre for her spiritual necessities, as she has on her 



396 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

parish church. If mob censorship cannot be trusted to 
keep naughty playwrights in order, still less can it be 
trusted to keep the pioneers of thought in countenance; 
and I submit that anyone hissing a play permitted by 
the new censorship should be guilty of contempt of court. 

Star Chamber Sentiment ah ty 

But what is most to be dreaded in a Star Chamber is 
not its sternness but its sentimentality. There is no 
worse censorship than one which considers only the feel- 
ings of the spectators, except perhaps one which consid- 
ers the feelings of people who do not even witness the 
performance. Take the case of the Passion Play at 
Oberammergau. The offence given by a representation 
of the Crucifixion on the stage is not bounded by front- 
iers : further, it is an offence of which the voluntary spec- 
tators are guilty no less than the actors. If it is to be 
tolerated at all: if we are not to make war on the Ger- 
man Empire for permitting it, nor punish the English 
people who go to Bavaria to see it and thereby endow it 
with English money, we may as well tolerate it in Lon- 
don, where nobody need go to see it except those who 
are not offended by it. When Wagner's Parsifal be- 
comes available for representation in London, many peo- 
ple will be sincerely horrified when the miracle of the 
Mass is simulated on the stage of Covent Garden, and 
the Holy Ghost descends in the form of a dove. But 
if the Committee of the Privy Council, or the Lord 
Chamberlain, or anyone else, were to attempt to keep 
Parsifal from us to spare the feelings of these people, 
it would not be long before even the most thoughtless 
champions of the censorship would see that the prin- 
ciple of doing nothing that could shock anybody had 
reduced itself to absurdity. No quarter whatever should 
be given to the bigotry of people so unfit for social life 



Preface 397 

as to insist not only that their own prejudices and su- 
perstitions should have the fullest toleration but that 
everybody else should be compelled to think and act as 
they do. Every service in St. Paul's Cathedral is an 
outrage to the opinions of the congregation of the Ro- 
man Catholic Cathedral of Westminster. Every Liberal 
meeting is a defiance and a challenge to the most cher- 
ished opinions of the Unionists. A law to compel the 
Roman Catholics to attend service at St. Paul's, or the 
Liberals to attend the meetings of the Primrose League 
would be resented as an insufferable tyranny. But a law 
to shut up both St. Paul's and the Westminster Cathe- 
dral, and to put down political meetings and associations 
because of the oifence given by them to many worthy and 
excellent people, would be a far worse tyranny, because 
it would kill the religious and political life of the coun- 
try outright, whereas to compel people to attend the 
services and meetings of their opponents would greatly 
enlarge their minds, and would actually be a good thing 
if it were enforced all round. I should not object to a 
law to compel everybody to read two newspapers, each 
violently opposed to the other in politics; but to forbid 
us to read newspapers at all would be to maim us men- 
tally and cashier our country in the ranks of civilization. 
I deny that anybody has the right to demand more from 
me, over and above lawful conduct in a general sense, 
than liberty to stay away from the theatre in which my 
plays are represented. If he is unfortunate enough to 
have a religion so petty that it can be insulted (any man 
is as welcome to insult my religion, if he can, as he is 
to insult the universe) I claim the right to insult it to 
my heart's content, if I choose, provided I do not compel 
him to come and hear me. If I think this country ought 
to make war on any other country, then, so long as war 
remains lawful, I claim full liberty to write and perform 
a play inciting the country to that war without interfer- 



398 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

ence from the ambassadors of the menaced country. I 
may " give pain to many worthy people, and pleasure 
to none," as the Censor's pet phrase puts it: I may even 
make Europe a cockpit and Asia a shambles: no matter: 
if preachers and politicians, statesmen and soldiers, may 
do these things — if it is right that such things should be 
done, then I claim my share in the right to do them. If 
the proposed Committee is meant to prevent me from 
doing these things whilst men of other professions are 
permitted to do them, then I protest with all my might 
against the formation of such a Committee. If it is to 
protect me, on the contrary, against the attacks that 
bigots and corrupt pornographers may make on me by 
appealing to the ignorance and prejudices of common 
jurors, then I welcome it; but is that really the object 
of its proposers? And if it is, what guarantee have I 
that the new tribunal will not presently resolve into a 
mere committee to avoid unpleasantness and keep the 
stage " in good taste " ? It is no more possible for me 
to do my work honestly as a playwright without giving 
pain than it is for a dentist. The nation's morals are 
like its teeth: the more decayed they are the more it 
hurts to touch them. Prevent dentists and dramatists 
from giving pain, and not only will our morals become 
as carious as our teeth, but toothache and the plagues 
that follow neglected morality will presently cause more 
agony than all the dentists and dramatists at their worst 
have caused since the world began. 

Anything for a Quiet Life 

Another doubt : would a Committee of the Privy Coun- 
cil really face the risks that must be taken by all com- 
munities as the price of our freedom to evolve? Would 
it not rather take the popular English view that freedom 
and virtue generally are sweet and desirable only when 



Preface 399 

they cost nothing? Nothing worth having is to be had 
without risk. A mother risks her child's life every time 
she lets it ramble through the countryside, or cross the 
street, or clamber over the rocks on the shore by itself. 
A father risks his son's morals when he gives him a 
latchkey. The members of the Joint Select Committee 
risked my producing a revolver and shooting them when 
they admitted me to the room without having me hand- 
cuffed. And these risks are no unreal ones. Every day 
some child is maimed or drowned and some young man 
infected with disease; and political assassinations have 
been appallingly frequent of late years. Railway trav- 
elling has its risks ; motoring has its risks ; aeroplaning 
has its risks ; every advance we make costs us a risk of 
some sort. And though these are only risks to the indi- 
vidual, to the community they are certainties. It is not 
certain that I will be killed this year in a railway acci- 
dent; but it is certain that somebody will. The inven- 
tion of printing and the freedom of the press have 
brought upon us, not merely risks of their abuse, but 
the establishment as part of our social routine of some 
of the worst evils a community can suffer from. People 
who realize these evils shriek for the suppression of mo- 
tor cars, the virtual imprisonment and enslavement of 
the young, the passing of Press Laws (especially in 
Egypt, India, and Ireland), exactly as they shriek for a 
censorship of the stage. The freedom of the stage will 
be abused just as certainly as the complaisance and in- 
nocence of the censorship is abused at present. It will 
also be used by writers like myself for raising very diffi- 
cult and disturbing questions, social, political, and relig- 
ious, at moments which may be extremely inconvenient 
to the government. Is it certain that a Committee of 
the Privy Council would stand up to all this as the price 
of liberty? I doubt it. If I am to be at the mercy 
of a nice amiable Committee of elderly gentlemen (I 



400 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

know all about elderly gentlemen, being one myself) 
whose motto is the highly popular one, " Anything for a 
quiet life," and who will make the inevitable abuses of 
freedom by our blackguards an excuse for interfering 
with any disquieting use of it by myself, then I shall 
be worse off than I am with the Lord Chamberlain, 
whose mind is not broad enough to obstruct the whole 
range of thought. If it were, he would be given a more 
difficult post. 

Shall the Examiner of Plays Starve? 

And here I may be reminded that if I prefer the Lord 
Chamberlain I can go to the Lord Chamberlain, who is 
to retain all his present functions for the benefit of 
those who prefer to be judged by him. But I am not 
so sure that the Lord Chamberlain will be able to ex- 
ercise those functions for long if resort to him is to be 
optional. Let me be kinder to him than he has been 
to me, and uncover for him the pitfalls which the Joint 
Select Committee have dug (and concealed) in his path. 
Consider how the voluntary system must inevitably work. 
The Joint Select Committee expressly urges that the 
Lord Chamberlain's licence must not be a bar to a prose- 
cution. Granted that in spite of this reservation the 
licence would prove in future as powerful a defence as 
it has been in the past, yet the voluntary clause never- 
theless places the manager at the mercy of any author 
who makes it a condition of his contract that his play 
shall not be submitted for licence. I should probably 
take that course without opposition from the manager. 
For the manager, knowing that three of my plays have 
been refused a licence, and that it would be far safer to 
produce a play for which no licence had been asked than 
one for which it had been asked and refused, would 
agree that it was more prudent, in my case, to avail him- 



Preface 401 

self of the power of dispensing with the Lord Chamber- 
lain's licence. But now mark the consequences. The 
manager, having thus discovered that his best policy was 
to dispense with the licence in the few doubtful cases, 
would presently ask himself why he should spend two 
guineas each on licences for the many plays as to which 
no question could conceivably arise. What risk does any 
manager run in producing such works as Sweet Laven- 
der, Peter Pan, The Silver King, or any of the 99 per 
cent of plays that are equally neutral on controversial 
questions.'' Does anyone seriously believe that the man- 
agers would continue to pay the Lord Chamberlain two 
guineas a play out of mere love and loyalty, only to 
create an additional risk in the case of controversial 
plays, and to guard against risks that do not exist in 
the case of the great bulk of other productions? Only 
those would remain faithful to him who produce such 
plays as the Select Committee began by discussing in 
camera, and ended by refusing to discuss at all because 
they were too nasty. These people would still try to get 
a licence, and would still no doubt succeed as they do 
today. But could the King's Reader of Plays live on 
his fees from these plays alone ; and if he could how long 
would his post survive the discredit of licensing only 
pornographic plays? It is clear to me that the Exam- 
iner would be starved out of existence, and the censor- 
ship perish of desuetude. Perhaps that is exactly what 
the Select Committee contemplated. If so, I have noth- 
ing more to say, except that I think sudden death would 
be more merciful. 



Lord Gorell's Awakening 

In the meantime, conceive the situation which would 
arise if a licensed play were prosecuted. To make it 
clearer, let us imagine any other offender — say a com- 



402 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

pany promoter with a fraudulent prospectus — pleading 
in Court that he had induced the Lord Chamberlain to 
issue a certificate that the prospectus contained nothing 
objectionable, and that on the strength of that certificate 
he issued it; also, that by law the Court could do noth- 
ing to him except order him to wind up his company. 
Some such vision as this must have come to Lord Gorell 
when he at last grappled seriously with the problem. 
Mr. Harcourt seized the opportunity to make a last 
rally. He seconded Lord Gorell's proposal that the 
Committee should admit that its scheme of an optional 
censorship was an elaborate absurdity, and report that 
all censorship before production was out of the question. 
But it was too late: the volte face was too sudden and 
complete. It was Lord Gorell whose vote had turned 
the close division which took place on the question of 
receiving my statement. It was Lord Gorell without 
whose countenance and authority the farce of the books 
could never have been performed. Yet here was Lord 
Gorell, after assenting to all the provisions for the op- 
tional censorship paragraph by paragraph, suddenly in- 
forming his colleagues that they had been wrong all 
through and that I had been right all through, and in- 
viting them to scrap half their work and adopt my con- 
clusion. No wonder Lord Gorell got only one vote: 
that of Mr. Harcourt. But the incident is not the less 
significant. Lord Gorell carried more weight than any 
other member of the Committee on the legal and con- 
stitutional aspect of the question. Had he begun where 
he left off — had he at the outset put down his foot on 
the njotion that an optional penal law could ever be any- 
thing but a gross contradiction in terms, that part of 
the Committee's proposals would never have come into 
existence. 



Preface 403 



Judges: Their Professional Limitations 

I do not, however, appeal to Lord Gorell's judgment 
on all points. It is inevitable that a judge should be 
deeply impressed by his professional experience with a 
sense of the impotence of judges and laws and courts 
to deal satisfactorily with evils which are so Protean and 
elusive as to defy definition, and which yet seem to pre- 
sent quite simple problems to the common sense of men 
of the world. You have only to imagine the Privy 
Council as consisting of men of the world highly en- 
dowed with common sense, to persuade yourself that 
the supplementing of the law by the common sense of 
the Privy Council would settle the whole difficulty. But 
no man knows what he means by common sense, though 
every man can tell you that it is very uncommon, even in 
Privy Councils. And since every ploughman is a man 
of the world, it is evident that even the phrase itself 
does not mean what it says. As a matter of fact, it 
means in ordinary use simply a man who will not make 
himself disagreeable for the sake of a principle: just the 
sort of man who should never be allowed to meddle with 
political rights. Now to a judge a political right, that 
is, a dogma which is above our laws and conditions our 
laws, instead of being subject to them, is anarchic and 
abhorrent. That is why I trust Lord Gorell when he is 
defending the integrity of the law against the proposal 
to make it in any sense optional, whilst I very strongly 
mistrust him, as I mistrust all professional judges, when 
political rights are in danger. 

Conclusion 

I must conclude by recommending the Government to 
take my advice wherever it conflicts with that of the 
Joint Select Committee. It is, I think, obviously more 



404 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

deeply considered and better informed, though I say it 
that should not. At all events, I have given my rea- 
sons ; and at that I must leave it. As the tradition which 
makes Malvolio not only Master of the Revels but Mas- 
ter of the Mind of England, and which has come down 
to us from Henry VIII., is manifestly doomed to the 
dustbin, the sooner it goes there the better ; for the demo- 
cratic control which naturally succeeds it can easily be 
limited so as to prevent it becoming either a censorship 
or a tyranny. The Examiner of Plays should receive a 
generous pension, and be set free to practise privately 
as an expert adviser of theatrical managers. There is 
no reason why they should be deprived of the counsel 
they so highly value. 

It only remains to say that public performances of 
The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet are still prohibited 
in Great Britain by the Lord Chamberlain. An attempt 
was made to prevent even its performance in Ireland by 
some indiscreet Castle officials in the absence of the 
Lord Lieutenant. This attempt gave extraordinary pub- 
licity to the production of the play; and every possible 
effort was made to persuade the Irish public that the 
performance would be an outrage to their religion, and 
to provoke a repetition of the rioting that attended the 
first performances of Synge's Playboy of the Western 
World before the most sensitive and, on provocation, the 
most turbulent audience in the kingdom. The directors 
of the Irish National Theatre, Lady Gregory and Mr. 
William Butler Yeats, rose to the occasion with inspirit- 
ing courage. I am a conciliatory person, and was will- 
ing, as I always am, to make every concession in return 
for having my own way. But Lady Gregory and Mr. 
Yeats not only would not yield an inch, but insisted, 
within the due limits of gallant warfare, on taking the 
field with every circumstance of defiance, and winning 
the battle with every trophy of victory. Their triumph 



i 



Preface 405 

was as complete as they could have desired. The per- 
formance exhausted the possibilities of success, and pro- 
voked no murmur, though it inspired several approving 
sermons. Later on, Lady Gregory and Mr. Yeats 
brought the play to London and performed it under the 
Lord Chamberlain's nose, through the instrumentality of 
the Stage Society. 

After this, the play was again submitted to the Lord 
Chamberlain. But, though beaten, he, too, understands 
the art of How Not To Do It. He licensed the play, 
but endorsed on his licence the condition that all the 
passages which implicated God in the history of Blanco 
Posnet must be omitted in representation. All the 
coarseness, the profligacy, the prostitution, the violence, 
the drinking-bar humor into which the light shines in 
the play are licensed, but the light itself is extinguished. 
I need hardly say that I have not availed myself of this 
licence, and do not intend to. There is enough licensed 
darkness in our theatres today without my adding to it. 

Ayot St. Lawrence, 
Uth July 1910. 



Postscript. — Since the above was written the Lord 
Chamberlain has made an attempt to evade his respon- 
sibility and perhaps to postpone his doom by appointing 
an advisory committee, unknown to the law, on which 
he will presumably throw any odium that may attach 
to refusals of licences in the future. This strange and 
lawless body will hardly reassure our moralists, who 
object much more to the plays he licenses than to those 
he suppresses, and are therefore unmoved by his plea that 
his refusals are few and far between. It consists of two 
eminent actors (one retired), an Oxford professor of lit- 
erature, and two eminent barristers. As their assembly 
is neither created by statute nor sanctioned by custom, it 



406 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

is difficult to know what to call it until it advises the 
Lord Chamberlain to deprive some author of his means 
of livelihood, when it will, I presume, become a con- 
spiracy, and be indictable accordingly; unless, indeed, it 
can persuade the Courts to recognize it as a new Estate 
of the Realm, created by the Lord Chamberlain. This 
constitutional position is so questionable that I strongly 
advise the members to resign promptly before the Lord 
Chamberlain gets them into trouble. 



THE SHEWING.UP OF BLANCO 
POSNET 

A number of women are sitting working together in a 
big room not unlike an old English tithe barn in its tim- 
bered construction, but with windows high up next the 
roof. It is furnished as a courthouse , with the floor 
raised next the walls, and on this raised flooring a seat 
for the Sheriff, a rough jury box on his right, and a bar 
to put prisoners to on his left. In the well in the middle 
is a table with benches round it. A few other benches 
are in disorder round the room. The autumn sun is 
shining warmly through the windows and the open door. 
The women, whose dress and speech are those of pion- 
eers of civilization in a territory of the United States of 
America, are seated round the table and on the benches, 
shucking nuts. The conversation is at its height. 

Babsy [a bumptious young slattern, with some good 
looks^ I say that a man that would steal a horse would 
do anything. 

Lottie [a sentimental girl, neat and clean] Well, I 
never should look at it in that way. I do think killing 
a man is worse any day than stealing a horse. 

Hannah [elderly and ivise] I dont say it's right to 
kill a man. In a place like this, where every man has 
to have a revolver, and where theres so much to try 

407 



408 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

people's tempers, the men get to be a deal too free with 
one another in the way of shooting. God knows it's hard 
enough to have to bring a boy into the world and nurse 
him up to be a man only to have him brought home to 
you on a shutter, perhaps for nothing, or only just to 
shew that the man that killed him wasnt afraid of him. 
But men are like children when they get a gun in their 
hands : theyre not content til theyve used it on somebody. 

Jessie [a good-natured but sharp-ton gued , hoity-toity 
young woman; Babsy's rival in good looks and her su- 
perior in tidiness] They shoot for the love of it. Look 
at them at a lynching. Theyre not content to hang the 
man ; but directly the poor creature is swung up they 
all shoot him full of holes, wasting their cartridges that 
cost solid money, and pretending they do it in horror 
of his wickedness, though half of them would have a 
rope round their own necks if all they did was known — 
let alone the mess it makes. 

Lottie. I wish we could get more civilized. I dont 
like all this lynching and shooting. I dont believe any 
of us like it, if the truth were known. 

Babsy. Our Sheriff is a real strong man. You want 
a strong man for a rough lot like our people here. He 
aint afraid to shoot and he aint afraid to hang. Lucky 
for us quiet ones, too. 

Jessie. Oh, dont talk to me. I know what men are. 
Of course he aint afraid to shoot and he aint afraid to 
hang. Wheres the risk in that with the law on his side 
and the whole crowd at his back longing for the lynch- 
ing as if it was a spree? Would one of them own to 
it or let him own to it if they lynched the wrong man? 
Not them. What they call justice in this place is noth- 
ing but a breaking out of the devil thats in all of us. 
What I want to see is a Sheriff that aint afraid not to 
shoot and not to hang. 

Emma [a sneak rvho sides with Babsy or Jessie, ac- 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 409 

cording to the fortune of 7var] Well, I must say it does 
sicken me to see Sheriff Kemp putting down his foot, as 
he calls it. Why dont he put it down on his wife? She 
wants it worse than half the men he lynches. He and 
his Vigilance Committee, indeed! 

Babsy [incensed] Oh, well! if people are going to 
take the part of horse-thieves against the Sheriff — ! 

Jessie. Who's taking the part of horse-thieves against 
the Sheriff.? 

Babsy. You are. Waitle your own horse is stolen, 
and youll know better. I had an uncle that died of 
thirst in the sage brush because a negro stole his horse. 
But they caught him and burned him; and serve him 
right, too. 

Emma. I have known that a child was born crooked 
because its mother had to do a horse's work that was 
stolen. 

Babsy. There! You hear that? I say stealing a 
horse is ten times worse than killing a man. And if the 
Vigilance Committee ever gets hold of you, youd better 
have killed twenty men than as much as stole a saddle 
or bridle, much less a horse. 

Elder Daniels comes in. 

Elder Daniels. Sorry to disturb you, ladies; but 
the Vigilance Committee has taken a prisoner; and they 
want the room to try him in. 

Jessie. But they cant try him til Sheriff Kemp comes 
back from the wharf. 

Elder Daniels. Yes; but we have to keep the pris- 
oner here til he comes. 

Babsy. What do you want to put him here for? 
Cant you tie him up in the Sheriff's stable? 

Elder Daniels. He has a soul to be saved, almost 
like the rest of us. I am bound to try to put some re- 
ligion into him before he goes into his Maker's presence 
after the trial. 



/ 



410 The She wing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Hannah. What has he done, Mr Daniels? 

Elder Daniels. Stole a horse. 

Babsy. And are we to be turned out of the town hall 
for a horse-thief? Aint a stable good enough for his 
religion ? 

Elder Daniels. It may be good enough for his, 
Babsy; but, by your leave, it is not good enough for 
mine. While I am Elder here, I shall umbly endeavour 
to keep up the dignity of Him I serve to the best of 
my small ability. So I must ask you to be good enough 
to clear out. Allow me. [He takes the sack of husks 
and put it out of the way against the panels of the jury 
box]. 

The Women \^mur muring] Thats always the way. 
Just as we'd settled down to work. WTiat harm are we 
doing? Well, it is tiresome. Let them finish the job 
themselves. Oh dear, oh dear ! We cant have a minute 
to ourselves. Shoving us out like that ! 

Hannah. Whose horse was it, Mr Daniels? 

Elder Daniels {returning to move the other sack] I 
am sorry to say that it was the Sheriff's horse — ^the one 
he loaned to young Strapper. Strapper loaned it to me ; 
and the thief stole it, thinking it was mine. If it had 
been mine, I'd have forgiven him cheerfully. I'm sure 
I hoped he would get away; for he had two hours start 
of the Vigilance Committee. But they caught him. \^He 
disposes of the other sack also]. 

Jessie. It cant have been much of a horse if they 
caught him with two hours start. 

Elder Daniels [coming hack to the centre of the 
group] The strange thing is that he wasnt on the horse 
when they took him. He was walking ; and of course he 
denies that he ever had the horse. The Sheriff's brother 
wanted to tie him up and lash him till he confessed what 
he'd done with it; but I couldnt allow that: it's not the 
law. 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 411 

Babsy. Law ! What right has a horse-thief to any 
law? Law is thrown away on a brute like that. 

Elder Daniels. Dont say that, Babsy. No man 
should be made to confess by cruelty until religion has 
been tried and failed. Please God I'll get the where- 
abouts of the horse from him if youll be so good as to 
clear out from this. [Disturbance outside]. They are 
bringing him in. Now ladies ! please, please. 

They rise reluctantly. Hannah, Jessie, and Lottie re- 
treat to the Sheriff's bench, shepherded by Daniels; but 
the other women crorvd forrvard behind Babsy and Emma 
to see the prisoner. 

Blanco Posnet is brought in by Strapper Kemp, the 
Sheriff's brother, and a cross-eyed man called Squinty. 
Others follow. Blanco is evidently a blackguard. It 
would be necessary to clean him to make a close guess 
at his age; but he is under forty, and an upturned, red 
moustache, and the arrangement of his hair in a crest 
on his brow, proclaim the dandy in spite of his intense 
disreputableness. He carries his head high, and has a 
fairly resolute mouth, though the fire of incipient de- 
lirium tremens is in his eye. 

His arms are bound with a rope with a long end, 
which Squinty holds. They release him when he en- 
ters; and he stretches himself and lounges across the 
courthouse in front of the women. Strapper and the 
men remain between him and the door. 

Babsy [spitting at him as he passes her] Horse- 
thief ! horse-thief ! 

Others. You will hang for it; do you hear.'' And 
serve you right. Serve you right. That will teach you. 
I wouldnt wait to try you. Lynch him straight off, the 
varmint. Yes, yes. Tell the boys. Lynch him. 

Blanco [mocking] " Angels ever bright and fair — " 

Babsy. You call me an angel, and I'll smack your 
dirty face for you. 



412 The Shewing- Up of Blanco Posnet 

Blanco. " Take, oh take me to your care." 

Emma. There wont be any angels where youre 
going to. 

Others. Aha! Devils, more likely. And too good 
company for a horse-thief. 

All. Horse-thief! Horse-thief! Horse-thief! 

Blanco. Do women make the law here, or men? 
Drive these heifers out. 

The Women. Oh! [They rush at him, vituperating, 
screaming passionately, tearing at him. Lottie puts her 
-fingers in her ears and runs out. Hannah follows, shak- 
ing her head. Blanco is thrown down]. Oh, did you 
hear what he called us .'' You foul-mouthed brute ! You 
liar! How dare you put such a name to a decent 
woman ? Let me get at him. You coward ! Oh, he 
struck me : did you see that ? Lynch him ! Pete, will 
you stand by and hear me called names by a skunk like 
that.'' Burn him: burn him! Thats what I'd do with 
him. Aye, burn him ! 

The Men [pulling the women away from Blanco, and 
getting them out partly by violence and partly by coax- 
ing] Here ! come out of this. Let him alone. Clear the 
courthouse. Come on now. Out with you. Now, Sally: 
out you go. Let go my hair, or I'll twist your arm out. 
Ah, would you? Now, then: get along. You know you 
must go. Whats the use of scratching like that? Now, 
ladies, ladies, ladies. How would you like it if you were 
going to be hanged? 

At last the women are pushed out, leaving Elder Dan- 
iels, the Sheriff's brother Strapper Kemp, and a few 
others with Blanco. Strapper is a lad just turning into 
a man: strong, selfish, sulky, and determined. 

Blanco [^sitting up and tidying himself] — 

Oh woman, in our hours of ease. 
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please — 



The Shewing- Up of Blanco Posnet 413 

Is my face scratched? I can feel their damned claws all 
over me still. Am I bleeding? [He sits on the nearest 
hench^. 

Elder Daniels. Nothing to hurt. Theyve drawn a 
drop or two under your left eye. 

Strapper. Lucky for you to have an eye left in your 
head. 

Blanco \_wiping the blood off\ — 

When pain and anguish wring the brow, 
A ministering angel thou. 

Go out to them, Strapper Kemp; and tell them about 
your big brother's little horse that some wicked man 
stole. Go and cry in your mammy's lap. 

Strapper {furious^ You jounce me any more about 
that horse, Blanco Posnet; and I'll — I'll — 

Blanco. Youll scratch my face, wont you? Yah! 
Your brother's the Sheriff, aint he? 

Strapper. Yes, he is. He hangs horse-thieves. 

Blanco [with calm conviction^ He's a rotten Sher- 
iff. Oh, a rotten Sheriff. If he did his first duty he'd 
hang himself. This is a rotten town. Your fathers 
came here on a false alarm of gold-digging; and when 
the gold didnt pan out, they lived by licking their young 
into habits of honest industry. 

Strapper. If I hadnt promised Elder Daniels here 
to give him a chance to keep you out of Hell, I'd take 
the job of twisting your neck off the hands of the Vig- 
ilance Committee. 

Blanco [with infinite scorn^ You and your rotten 
Elder, and your rotten Vigilance Committee ! 

Strapper. Theyre sound enough to hang a horse- 
thief, anyhow. 

Blanco. Any fool can hang the wisest man in the 
country. Nothing he likes better. But you cant hang 



414 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Strapper. Cant we? 

Blanco. No, you cant. I left the town this morn- 
ing before sunrise, because it's a rotten town, and I 
couldnt bear to see it in the light. Your brother's horse 
did the same, as any sensible horse would. Instead of 
going to look for the horse, you went looking for me. 
That was a rotten thing to do, because the horse belonged 
to your brother — or to the man he stole it from — and I 
dont belong to him. Well, you found me ; but you didn't 
find the horse. If I had took the horse, I'd have been 
on the horse. Would I have taken all that time to get 
to where I did if I'd a horse to carry me? 

Strapper. I dont believe you started not for two 
hours after you say you did. 

Blanco. Who cares what you believe or dont be- 
lieve? Is a man worth six of you to be hanged because 
youve lost your big brother's horse, and youll want to 
kill somebody to relieve your rotten feelings when he 
licks you for it? Not likely. Till you can find a witness 
that saw me with that horse you cant touch me; and you 
know it. 

Strapper. Is that the law. Elder? 

Elder Daniels. The Sheriff knows the law. I 
wouldnt say for sure; but I think it would be more 
seemly to have a witness. Go and round one up. Strap- 
per; and leave me here alone to wrestle with his poor 
blinded soul. 

Strapper. I'll get a witness all right enough. I 
know the road he took; and I'll ask at every house with- 
in sight of it for a mile out. Come boys. 

Strapper goes out with the others, leaving Blanco 
and Elder Daniels together. Blanco rises and strolls 
over to the Elder, surveying him with extreme disparage- 
ment. 

Blanco. Well, brother? Well, Boozy Posnet, alias 
Elder Daniels? Well, thief? Well, drunkard? 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 415 

Elder Daniels. It's no good, Blanco. Tlieyll never 
believe we're brothers. 

Blanco. Never fear. Do you suppose I want to 
claim you.'' Do you suppose I'm proud of you? Youre 
a rotten brother, Boozy Posnet. All you ever did when 
I owned you was to borrow money from me to get drunk 
with. Now you lend money and sell drink to other peo- 
ple. I was ashamed of you before; and I'm worse 
ashamed of you now. I wont have you for a brother. 
Heaven gave you to me; but I return the blessing with- 
out thanks. So be easy: I shant blab. [He turns his 
back on him and sits down^. 

Elder Daniels. I tell you they wouldnt believe you; 
so what does it matter to me whether you blab or 
not.'' Talk sense, Blanco: theres no time for your fool- 
ery now; for youll be a dead man an hour after the 
Sheriff comes back. What possessed you to steal that 
horse ? 

Blanco. I didnt steal it. I distrained on it for what 
you owed me. I thought it was yours. I was a fool to 
think that you owned anything but other people's prop- 
erty. You laid your hands on everything father and 
mother had when they died. I never asked you for a 
fair share. I never asked you for all the money I'd 
lent you from time to time. I asked you for mother's 
old necklace with the hair locket in it. You wouldnt 
give me that: you wouldnt give me anything. So as 
you refused me my due I took it, just to give you 
a lesson. 

Elder Daniels. Why didnt you take the necklace if 
you must steal something.'' They wouldnt have hanged 
you for that. 

Blanco. Perhaps I'd rather be hanged for stealing 
a horse than let off for a damned piece of sentimentality. 

Elder Daniels. Oh, Blanco, Blanco: spiritual pride 
has been your ruin. If youd only done like me, youd 



416 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

be a free and respectable man this day instead of laying 
there with a rope round your neck. 

Blanco [turning on him] Done like you ! What do 
you mean? Drink like you^ eh? Well, Ive done some of 
that lately. I see things. 

Elder Daniels. Too late, Blanco: too late. [Con- 
vulsively] Oh, why didnt you drink as I used to? Why 
didnt you drink as I was led to by the Lord for my 
good, until the time came for me to give it up? It was 
drink that saved my character when I was a young man ; 
and it was the want of it that spoiled yours. Tell me 
this. Did I ever get drunk when I was working? 

Blanco. No; but then you never worked when you 
had money enough to get drunk. 

Elder Daniels, That just shews the wisdom of 
Providence and the Lord's mercy. God fulfils himself 
in many ways: ways we little think of when we try to 
set up our own shortsighted laws against his Word. 
When does the Devil catch hold of a man? Not when 
he's working and not when he's drunk; but when he's 
idle and sober. Our own natures tell us to drink when 
we have nothing else to do. Look at you and me ! When 
we'd both earned a pocketful of money, what did we do? 
Went on the spree, naturally. But I was humble minded. 
I did as the rest did. I gave my money in at the drink- 
shop; and I said, " Fire me out when I have drunk it 
all up." Did you ever see me sober while it lasted? 

Blanco, No; and you looked so disgusting that I 
wonder it didnt set me against drink for the rest of my 
life. 

Elder Daniels. That was your spiritual pride, 
Blanco. You never reflected that when I was drunk I 
was in a state of innocence. Temptations and bad com- 
pany and evil thoughts passed by me like the summer 
wind as you might say: I was too drunk to notice them. 
When the money was gone, and they fired me out, I 



The She wing-Up of Blanco Posnet 417 

was fired out like gold out of the furnace, with my char- 
acter unspoiled and unspotted; and when I went back to 
work, the work kept me steady. Can you say as much, 
Blanco? Did your holidays leave your character un- 
spoiled? Oh, no, no. It was theatres: it was gambling: 
it was evil company : it was reading in vain romances : it 
was women, Blanco, women: it was wrong thoughts and 
gnawing discontent. It ended in your becoming a ram- 
bler and a gambler: it is going to end this evening on 
the gallows tree. Oh, what a lesson against spiritual 
pride! Oh, what a — [Blanco throws his hat at him]. 

Blanco. Stow it. Boozy. Sling it. Cut it. Cheese 
it. Shut up. " Shake not the dying sinner's sand." 

Elder Daniels. Aye: there you go, with your 
scraps of lustful poetry. But you cant deny what I tell 
you. Why, do you think I would put my soul in peril 
by selling drink if I thought it did no good, as them 
silly temperance reformers make out, flying in the face 
of the natural tastes implanted in us all for a good pur- 
pose? Not if I was to starve for it to-morrow. But I 
know better. I tell you, Blanco, what keeps America to- 
day the purest of the nations is that when she's not 
working she's too drunk to hear the voice of the 
tempter. 

Blanco. Dont deceive yourself. Boozy. You sell 
drink because you make a bigger profit out of it than 
you can by selling tea. And you gave up drink yourself 
because when you got that fit at Edwardstown the doc- 
tor told you youd die the next time ; and that frightened 
you off it. 

Elder Daniels [fervently] Oh thank God selling 
drink pays me ! And thank God he sent me that fit as 
a warning that my drinking time was past and gone, and 
that he needed me for another service ! 

Blanco. Take care. Boozy. He hasnt finished with 
you yet. He always has a trick up His sleeve — 



418 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Elder Daniels. Oli, is that the way to speak of the 
ruler of the universe — the great and almighty God? 

Blanco, He's a sly one. He's a mean one. He lies 
low for you. He plays cat and mouse with you. He lets 
you run loose until you think youre shut of him; and 
then, when you least expect it, he's got you. 

Elder Daniels. Speak more respectful, Blanco — 
more reverent. 

Blanco [spi-inging up and coming at hiin] Rever- 
ent! Who taught you your reverent cant? Not your 
Bible. It says He cometh like a thief in the night — 
aye, like a thief — a horse-thief — 

Elder Daniels [shocked] Oh ! 

Blanco [overhearing hint] And it's true. Thats 
how He cavight me and put my neck into the halter. To 
sjDite me because I had no use for Him — because I lived 
my own life in my own way, and would have no truck 
with His " Dont do this," and " You mustnt do that," 
and " Youll go to Hell if you do the other." I gave 
Him the go-bye and did without Him all these years. 
But He caught me out at last. The laugh is with Him 
as far as hanging me goes. [He thrusts his hands into 
his pockets and lounges moodily away from Daniels, to 
the table, where he sits facing the jury box]. 

Elder Daniels. Dont dare to put your theft on 
Him, man. It was the Devil tempted you to steal the 
horse. 

Blanco. Not a bit of it. Neither God nor Devil 
tempted me to take the horse: I took it on my own. He 
had a cleverer trick than that ready for me. [He takes 
his hands oiit of his pockets and clenches his fists]. 
Gosh ! When I think that I might liave been safe and 
fifty miles away by now with that horse; and here I am 
waiting to be hung up and filled with lead ! What came 
to me ? What made me such a fool ? Thats what I want 
to know. Thats the great secret. 



The She wing-Up of Blanco Posnet 419 

Elder Daniels [at the opposite side of the table] 
Blanco: the great secret now is^ what did you do with 
the horse? 

Blanco [striking the table with his fist] May my 
lips be blighted like my soul if ever I tell that to you or 
any mortal men ! They may roast me alive or cut me 
to ribbons ; but Strapper Kemp shall never have the 
laugh on me over that job. Let them hang me. Let 
them shoot. So long as they are shooting a man and 
not a sniveling skunk and softy, I can stand up to them 
and take all they can give me — game. 

Elder Daniels. Dont be headstrong, Blanco. Whats 
the use.'' [Slyly] They might let up on you if you 
put Strapper in the way of getting his brother's horse 
back. 

Blanco. Not they. Hanging's too big a treat for 
them to give up a fair chance. Ive done it myself. Ive 
yelled with the dirtiest of them when a man no worse 
than myself was swung up. Ive emptied my revolver 
into him, and persuaded myself that he deserved it and 
that I was doing justice with strong stern men. Well, 
my turn's come now. Let the men I yelled at and shot 
at look up out of Hell and see the boys yelling and 
shooting at me as I swing up. 

Elder Daniels. Well, even if you want to be 
hanged, is that any reason why Strapper shouldnt have 
his horse? I tell you I'm responsible to him for it. 
[Be7idi7ig over the table and coaxing him]. Act like a 
brother, Blanco: tell me what you done with it. 

Blanco [shortly, getting up and leaving the table] 
Never you mind what I done with it. I was done out 
of it. Let that be enough for you. 

Elder Daniels [following him] Then why dont you 
put us on to the man that done you out of it? 

Blanco. Because he'd be too clever for you, just as 
he was too clever for me. 



420 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Elder Daniels. Make your mind easy about that, 
Blanco. He Avont be too clever for the boys and Sheriff 
Kemp if you put them on his trail. 

Blanco. Yes he will. It wasnt a man. 

Elder Daniels. Then what was it? 

Blanco [pointing upward] Him. 

Elder Daniels. Oh what a way to utter His holy 
name ! 

Blanco. He done me out of it. He meant to pay 
off old scores by bringing me here. He means to win 
the deal and you cant stop Him. Well, He's made a 
fool of me; but He cant frighten me. I'm not going to 
beg off. I'll fight off if I get a chance. I'll lie off if 
they cant get a witness against me. But back down I 
never will, not if all the hosts of heaven come to snivel 
at me in white surplices and offer me my life in exchange 
for an umble and a contrite heart. 

Elder Daniels. Youre not in your right mind, 
Blanco. I'll tell em youre mad. I believe they 11 let you 
off on that. [He makes for the door]. 

Blanco [seising him, with horror in his eyes^ Dont 
go: dont leave me alone: do you hear? 

Elder Daniels. Has your conscience brought you to 
this, that youre afraid to be left alone in broad daylight, 
like a child in the dark? 

Blanco. I'm afraid of Him and His tricks. When 
I have you to raise the devil in me — when I have peo- 
ple to shew off before and keep me game, I'm all right; 
but Ive lost my nerve for being alone since this morn- 
ing. It's when youre alone that He takes His advan- 
tage. He might turn my head again. He might send 
people to me — not real people perhaps. [Shivering] 
By God, I dont believe that woman and the child were 
real. I dont. I never noticed them till they were at my 
elbow. 

Elder Daniels. What woman and what child? What 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 421 

are you talking about? Have you been drinking too 
hard ? 

Blanco. Never you mind. Youve got to stay with 
me: thats all; or else send someone else — someone rot- 
tener than yourself to keep the devil in me. Strapper 
Kemp will do. Or a few of those scratching devils of 
women. 

Strapper Kemp comes bach. 

Elder Daniels [to i^trapper] He's gone off his 
head. 

Strapper. Foxing, more likely. [Going past Dan- 
iels and talking to Blanco nose to nose^ It's no good: 
we hang madmen here; and a good job too! 

Blanco. I feel safe with you. Strapper. Youre one 
of the rottenest. 

Strapper. You know youre done, and that you may 
as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb. So talk away. 
Ive got my witness; and I'll trouble you not to make a 
move towards her when she comes in to identify you. 

Blanco [retreating in terror] A woman.'' She aint 
real: neither is the child. 

Elder Daniels. He's raving about a woman and a 
child. I tell you he's gone off his chump. 

Strapper [calling to those without] Shew the lady 
in there. 

Feemy Evans comes in. She is a young woman of 23 
or 2Jf, with impudent manners, battered good looks, and 
dirty-fine dress. 

Elder Daniels. Morning, Feemy, 

Feemy. Morning, Elder. [She passes on and slips 
her arm familiarly through Strapper's]. 

Strapper. Ever see him before, Feemy? 

Feemy. Thats the little lot that was on your horse 
this morning. Strapper. Not a doubt of it. 

Blanco [implacably contemptuous] Go home and 
wash yourself, you slut. 



422 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Feemy [reddening, and disengaging her arm from 
Strapper's] I'm clean enough to hang you, anyway. 
[Going over to him threateningly]. Youre no true 
American man, to insult a woman like that. 

Blanco. A woman! Oh Lord! You saw me on a 
horse, did you? 

Feemy. Yes I did. 

Blanco. Got up early on purpose to do it, didnt 
you? 

Feemy. No I didnt: I stayed up late on a spree. 

Blanco. I was on a horse, was I? 

Feemy. Yes you were; and if you deny it youre a 
liar. 

Blanco [to Strapper] She saw a man on a horse 
when she was too drunk to tell which was the man and 
which was the horse — 

Feemy [breaking in] You lie. I wasnt drunk — at 
least not as drunk as that. 

Blanco [ignoring the interruption] — and you found 
a man without a horse. Is a man on a horse the same 
as a man on foot? Yah! Take your witness away. 
Who's going to believe her ? Shove her into the dustbin. 
Youve got to find that horse before you get a rope round 
my neck. [He turns away from her contemptuously, 
and sits at the table with his back to the jury box]. 

Feemy [following him] I'll hang you, you dirty 
horse-thief; or not a man in this camp will ever get a 
word or a look from me again. Youre just trash: thats 
what you are. White trash. 

Blanco. And what are you, darling? What are you? 
Youre a worse danger to a town like this than ten horse- 
thieves. 

Feemy. Mr Kemp: will you stand by and hear me 
insulted in that low way? [To Blanco, spitefully] I'll 
see you swimg up and I'll see you cut down: I'll see you 
high and I'll see you low, as dangerous as I am. \^He 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 423 

laughs]. Oh you neednt try to brazen it out. Youll 
look white enough before the boys are done with you. 

Blanco. You do me good, Feemy. Stay by me to 
the end, wont you.'' Hold my hand to the last; and I'll 
die game. [He puts out his hand: she strikes savagely 
at it; but he withdraws it in time and laughs at her dis- 
comfiture] . 

Feemy. You — 

Elder Daniels. Never mind him, Feemy: he's not 
right in his head to-day. [She receives the assurance 
with contemptuous credulity, and sits down on the step 
of the Sheriff's dais]. 

Sheriff Kemp comes in: a stout man, with large flat 
ears, and a neck thicker than his head. 

Elder Daniels. Morning, Sheriff. 

The Sheriff. Morning, Elder. [Passing on]. Morn- 
ing, Strapper. [Passing on]. Morning, Miss Evans. 
[Stopping between Strapper and Blanco]. Is this the 
prisoner ? 

Blanco [rising] Thats so. Morning, Sheriff. 

The Sheriff. Morning. You know, I suppose, that 
if youve stole a horse and the jury find against you, you 
wont have any time to settle your affairs. Consequently, 
if you feel guilty, youd better settle em now. 

Blanco. Affairs be damned! Ive got none. 

The Sheriff. Well, are you in a proper state of 
mind.'' Has the Elder talked to you? 

Blanco. He has. And I say it's against the law. 
It's torture: thats what it is. 

Elder Daniels. He's not accountable. He's out of 
his mind. Sheriff. He's not fit to go into the presence 
of his Maker. 

The Sheriff. You are a merciful man. Elder; but 
you wont take the boys with you there. [To Blanco]. 
If it comes to hanging you, youd better for your own 
sake be hanged in a proper state of mind than in an 



424 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

improper one. But it wont make any difference to us: 
make no mistake about that. 

Blanco. Lord keep me wicked till I die ! Now Ive 
said my little prayer. I'm ready. Not that I'm guilty, 
mind you; but this is a rotten town, dead certain to do 
the wrong thing. 

The Sheriff. You wont be asked to live long in it, 
I guess. [To Strapper] Got the witness all right. 
Strapper .'' 

Strapper. Yes, got everything. 

Blanco. Except the horse. 

The Sheriff. Whats that? Aint you got the horse? 

Strapper. No. He traded it before we overtook 
him, I guess. But Feemy saw him on it. 

Feemy. She did. 

Strapper. Shall I call in the boys ? 

Blanco. Just a moment, Sheriff. A good appear- 
ance is everything in a low-class place like this. [He 
takes out a pocket comb and mirror, and retires towards 
the dais to arrange his hair]. 

Elder Daniels. Oh, think of your immortal soul, 
man, not of your foolish face. 

Blanco. I cant change my soul, Elder: it changes 
me — sometimes. Feemy: I'm too pale. Let me rub my 
cheek against yours, darling. 

Feemy. You lie: my color's my own, such as it is. 
And a pretty color youll be when youre hung white and 
shot red. 

Blanco. Aint she spiteful. Sheriff? 

The Sheriff. Time's wasted on you. [To Strap- 
per] Go and see if the boys are ready. Some of them 
were short of cartridges, and went down to the store to 
buy them. They may as well have their fun; and itll 
be shorter for him. 

Strapper. Young Jack has brought a boxful up. 
Theyre all ready. 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 425 

The Sheriff [going to the dais and addressing 
Blanco] Your place is at the bar there. Take it. 
[Blanco bows ironically and goes to the bar]. Miss 
Evans: youd best sit at the table. [She does so, at the 
corner nearest the bar. The Elder takes the opposite 
corner. The Sheriff takes his chair]. All ready. Strap- 
per. 

Strapper [at the door] All in to begin. 

The crowd comes in and fills the court. Babsy, Jessie, 
and Emma come to the Sheriff's right; Hannah and Lot- 
tie to his left. 

The Sheriff. Silence there. The jury will take 
their places as usual. [They do so]. 

Blanco. I challenge this jury. Sheriff. 

The Foreman. Do you, by Gosh.'* 

The Sheriff. On what ground.'' 

Blanco. On the general ground that it's a rotten 
jury, [Laughter]. 

The Sheriff. Thats not a lawful ground of chal- 
lenge. 

The Foreman. It's a lawful ground for me to shoot 
yonder skunk at sight, first time I meet him, if he sur- 
vives this trial. 

Blanco. I challenge the Foreman because he's preju- 
diced. 

The Foreman. I say you lie. We mean to hang 
you, Blanco Posnet; but you will be hanged fair. 

The Jury. Hear, hear ! 

Strapper [to the Sheriff] George : this is rot. How 
can you get an unprejudiced jury if the prisoner starts 
by telling them theyre all rotten? If theres any preju- 
dice against him he has himself to thank for it. 

The Boys. Thats so. Of course he has. Insulting 
the court! Challenge be jiggered! Gag him. 

Nestor [a juryman with a long white beard, drunk, 
the oldest man present] Besides, Sheriff, I go so far 



426 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

as to say that the man that is not prejudiced against a 
horse-thief is not fit to sit on a jury in this town. 

The Boys. Right. Bully for you, Nestor ! Thats 
the straight truth. Of course he aint. Hear, hear ! 

The Sheriff. That is no doubt true, old man. 
Still, you must get as unprejudiced as you can. The 
critter has a right to his chance, such as he is. So now 
go right ahead. If the prisoner dont like this jury, he 
should have stole a horse in another town; for this is 
all the jury he'll get here. 

The Foreman. Thats so, Blanco Posnet. 

The Sheriff [<o Blanco] Dont you be uneasy. You 
will get justice here. It may be rough justice; but it is 
justice. 

Blanco. What is justice? 

The Sheriff. Hanging horse-thieves is justice; so 
now you know. Now then: weve wasted enough time. 
Hustle with your witness there, will you? 

Blanco [^indignantly bringing down his fist on the 
bar] Swear the jury. A rotten Sheriff you are not to 
know that the jury's got to be sworn. 

The Foreman [galled] Be swore for you ! Not 
likely. What do you say, old son? 

Nestor [deliberately and solemnly] I say : Guilty ! ! ! 

The Boys [tumultuously rushing at Blanco] Thats 
it. Guilty, guilty. Take him out and hang him. He's 
found guilty. Fetch a rope. Up with him. [They are 
about to drag him from the bar] . 

The Sheriff [rising, pistol in hand] Hands off that 
man. Hands off him, I say, Squinty, or I drop you, and 
would if you were my own son. [Dead silence]. I'm 
Sheriff here; and it's for me to say when he may law- 
fully be hanged. [They release him], 

Blanco. As the actor says in the play, " a Daniel 
come to judgment." Rotten actor he was, too. 

The Sheriff. Elder Daniel is come to judgment all 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Fosnet 427 

right, my lad. Elder: the floor is yours. [The Elder 
rises]. Give your evidence. The truth and the whole 
truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God. 

Elder Daniels. Sheriff: let me off this. I didnt 
ought to swear away this man's life. He and I are, in 
a manner of speaking, brothers. 

The Sheriff. It does you credit. Elder: every man 
here will acknowledge it. But religion is one thing: law 
is another. In religion we're all brothers. In law we 
cut our brother off when he steals horses. 

The Foreman. Besides, you neednt hang him, you 
know. Theres plenty of willing hands to take that job 
off your conscience. So rip ahead, old son. 

Strapper. Youre accountable to me for the horse 
until you clear yourself. Elder: remember that. 

Blanco. Out with it, you fool. 

Elder Daniels. You might own up, Blanco, as far 
as my evidence goes. Everybody knows I borrowed one 
of the Sheriff's horses from Strapper because my own's 
gone lame. Everybody knows you arrived in the town 
yesterday and put up in my house. Everybody knows 
that in the morning the horse was gone and you were 
gone. 

Blanco [in a forensic manner] Sheriff: the Elder, 
though known to you and to all here as no brother of 
mine and the rottenest liar in this town, is speaking the 
truth for the first time in his life as far as what he says 
about me is concerned. As to the horse, I say nothing; 
except that it was the rottenest horse you ever tried to 
sell. 

The Sheriff. How do you know it was a rotten 
horse if you didnt steal it.'' 

Blanco. I dont know of my own knowledge. I 
only argue that if the horse had been worth its keep, you 
wouldnt have lent it to Strapper, and Strapper wouldnt 
have lent it to this eloquent and venerable ram. [Sup- 



428 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

pressed laughter]. And now I ask him this. [To the 
Elder] Did we or did we not have a quarrel last evening 
about a certain article that was left by my mother, and 
that I considered I had a right to more than you? And 
did you say one word to me about the horse not belong- 
ing to you? 

Elder Daniels. Why should I? We never said a 
word about the horse at all. How was I to know what 
it was in your mind to do? 

Blanco. Bear witness all that I had a right to take 
a horse from him without stealing to make up for what 
he denied me. I am no thief. But you havnt proved 
yet that I took the horse. Strapper Kemp: had I the 
horse when you took me, or had I not? 

Strapper. No, nor you hadnt a railway train neither. 
But Feemy Evans saw you pass on the horse at four 
o'clock twenty-five miles from the spot where I took 
you at seven on the road to Pony Harbor. Did you 
walk twenty-five miles in three hours? That so, 
Feemy, eh? 

Feemy. Thats so. At four I saw him. [To Blanco] 
Thats done for you. 

The Sheriff. You say you saw him on my horse? 

Feemy. I did. 

Blanco. And I ate it, I suppose, before Strapper 
fetched up with me. [Suddenly and dramatically] 
Sheriff: I accuse Feemy of immoral relations with 
Strapper. 

Feemy. Oh you liar ! 

Blanco. I accuse the fair Euphemia of immoral re- 
lations with every man in this town, including yourself. 
Sheriff. I say this is a conspiracy to kill me between 
Feemy and Strapper because I wouldnt touch Feemy 
with a pair of tongs. I say you darent hang any white 
man on the word of a woman of bad character. I stand 
on the honor and virtue of my American manhood. I 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 429 

say that she's not had the oath, and that you darent for 
the honor of the town give her the oath because her lips 
would blaspheme the holy Bible if they touched it. I 
say thats the law; and if you are a proper United States 
Sheriff and not a low-down lyncher, youll hold up the 
law and not let it be dragged in the mud by your broth- 
er's kept woman. 

Great excitement among the women. The men much 
puzzled. 

Jessie. Thats right. She didnt ought to be let kiss 
the Book. 

Emma. How could the like of her tell the truth? 

Babsy. It would be an insult to every respectable 
woman here to believe her, 

Feemy. It's easy to be respectable with nobody ever 
offering you a chance to be anything else. 

The Women [clamoring all together] Shut up, you 
hussy. Youre a disgrace. How dare you open your lips 
to answer your betters ? Hold your tongue and learn 
your place, miss. You painted slut! Whip her out of 
the town ! 

The Sheriff. Silence, Do you hear.^ Silence. 
[^The clamor ceases]. Did anyone else see the prisoner 
with the horse ? 

Feemy [passionately] Aint I good enough? 

Bab«y. No. Youre dirt: thats what you are. 

Feemy. And you — 

The Sheriff. Silence. This trial is a man's job; 
and if the women forget their sex they can go out or 
be put out. Strapper and Miss Evans : you cant have it 
two ways. You can run straight, or you can run gay, so 
to speak ; but you cant run both ways together. There is 
also a strong feeling among the men of this town that a 
line should be drawn between those that are straight 
wives and mothers and those that are, in the words of 
the Book of Books, taking the primrose path. We dont 



430 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

wish to be hard on any woman; and most of us have a 
personal regard for Miss Evans for the sake of old 
times ; but theres no getting out of the fact that she has 
private reasons for wishing to oblige Strapper, and that 
— if she will excuse my saying so — she is not what I 
might call morally particular as to what she does to 
oblige him. Therefore I ask the prisoner not to drive us 
to give Miss Evans the oath. I ask him to tell us fair 
and square, as a man who has but a few minutes between 
him and eternity, what he done with my horse. 

The Boys. Hear, hear! Thats right. Thats fair. 
That does it. Now Blanco. Own up. 

Blanco. Sheriff: you touch me home. This is a 
rotten world; but there is still one thing in it that re- 
mains sacred even to the rottenest of us, and that is a 
horse. 

The Boys. Good. Well said, Blanco. Thats straight. 

Blanco. You have a right to your horse. Sheriff; 
and if I could put you in the way of getting it back, I 
would. But if I had that horse I shouldnt be here. As 
I hope to be saved. Sheriff — or rather as I hope to 
be damned; for I have no taste for pious company and 
no talent for playing the harp — I know no more of that 
horse's whereabouts than you do yourself. 

Strapper. Who did you trade him to.^ 

Blanco. I did not trade him. I got nothing for him 
or by him. I stand here with a rope round my neck 
for the want of him. When you took me, did I fight 
like a thief or run like a thief; and was there any sign 
of a horse on me or near me? 

Strapper. You were looking at a rainbow like a 
damned silly fool instead of keeping your wits about 
you; and we stole up on you and had you tight before 
you could draw a bead on us. 

The Sheriff. That dont sound like good sense. 
What would he look at a rainbow for? 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 431 

Blanco. I'll tell you, Sheriff, I was looking at it 
because there was something written on it. 

Sheriff. How do you mean written on it? 

Blanco. The words were, " Ive got the cinch on you 
this time, Blanco Posnet." Yes, Sheriff, I saw those 
words in green on the red streak of the rainbow; and as 
I saw them I felt Strapper's grab on my arm and Squin- 
ty's on my pistol. 

The Foreman. He's shammin mad: thats what he 
is. Aint it about time to give a verdict and have a bit 
of fun. Sheriff? 

The Boys. Yes, lets have a verdict. We're wasting 
the whole afternoon. Cut it short. 

The Sheriff [making up his mind] Swear Feemy 
Evans, Elder. She dont need to touch the Book. Let 
her say the words. 

Feemy. Worse people than me has kissed that Book. 
What wrong Ive done, most of you went shares in, Ive 
to live, havnt I ? same as the rest of you. However, it 
makes no odds to me. I guess the truth is the truth and 
a lie is a lie, on the Book or off it. 

Babsy, Do as youre told. Who are you, to be let 
talk about it? 

The Sheriff, Silence there, I tell you. Sail ahead. 
Elder. 

Elder Daniels. Feemy Evans: do you swear to tell 
the truth and the whole truth and nothing but the truth, 
so help you God? 

Feemy. I do, so help me — 

Sheriff. Thats enough. Now, on your oath, did 
you see the prisoner on my horse this morning on the 
road to Pony Harbor? 

Feemy. On my oath — [Disturbance and crowding at 
the door]. 

At The Door. Now then, now then ! Where are 
you shovin to? Whats up? Order in court. Chuck 



432 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

him out. Silence. You cant come in here. Keep 
back. 

Strapper rushes to the door and forces his way out. 

Sheriff [savagely] Whats this noise? Cant you 
keep quiet there.'' Is this a Sheriff's court or is it a 
saloon } 

Blanco. Dont interrupt a lady in the act of hanging 
a gentleman. Wheres your manners? 

Feemy. I'll hang you, Blanco Posnet. I will. I 
wouldnt for fifty dollars hadnt seen you this morning. 
I'll teach you to be civil to me next time, for all I'm not 
good enough to kiss the Book. 

Blanco. Lord keep me wicked till I die! I'm game 
for anything while youre spitting dirt at me, Feemy. 

Renewed Tumult At The Door. Here, whats this? 
Fire them out. Not me. Who are you that I should 
get out of your way? Oh, stow it. Well, she cant come 
in. What woman? What horse? Whats the good of 
shoving like that? Who says? No! you dont say! 

The Sheriff. Gentlemen of the Vigilance Commit- 
tee: clear that doorway. Out with them in the name of 
the law. 

Strapper [without] Hold hard, George. [At the 
door] Theyve got the horse. [He comes in, followed 
by Waggoner Jo, an elderly carter, who crosses the court 
to the jury side. Strapper pushes his way to the Sher- 
iff and speaks privately to him]. 

The Boys. What! No! Got the horse! Sheriff's 
horse? Who took it, then? Where? Get out. Yes it 
is, sure. I tell you it is. It's the horse all right enough. 
Rot. Go and look. By Gum! 

The Sheriff [to Strapper] You dont say! 

Strapper. It's here, I tell you. 

Waggoner Jo. It's here all right enough. Sheriff. 

Strapper. And theyve got the thief too. 

Elder Daniels. Then it aint Blanco. 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 433 

Strapper. No: it's a woman. [Blanco yells and 
covers his eyes with his hands]. 

The Whole Crowd. A woman ! 

The Sheriff. Well, fetch her in. [Strapper goes 
out. The Sheriff continues, to Feemy] And what do 
you mean, you lying jade, by putting up this story on 
us about Blanco? 

Feemy. I aint put up no story on you. This is a 
plant: you see if it isnt. 

Strapper returns with a woman. Her expression of 
intense grief silences them as they crane over one an- 
other's heads to see her. Strapper takes her to the cor- 
ner of the table. The Elder moves up to make room 
for her. 

Blanco [terrified] : that woman aint real. You take 
care. That woman will make you do what you never 
intended. Thats the rainbow woman. Thats the woman 
that brought me to this. 

The Sheriff. Shut your mouth, will you. Youve 
got the horrors. [To the woman] Now you. Who are 
you.'' and what are you doing with a horse that doesnt 
belong to you? 

The Woman. I took it to save my child's life. I 
thought it would get me to a doctor in time. It was 
choking with croup. 

Blanco [strangling, and trying to laugh] A little 
choker : thats the word for him. His choking wasnt real : 
wait and see mine. [He feels his neck with a sob]. 

The Sheriff. Where's the child? 

Strapper. On Pug Jackson's bench in his shed. 
He's makin a coffin for it. 

Blanco [with a horrible convulsion of the throat — 
frantically] Dead! The little Judas kid! The child 
I gave my life for! [He breaks into hideous laugh- 
ter']. 

The Sheriff [jarred beyond endurance by the sound] 



434 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Hold you noise ! will you ? Shove his neckerchief into 
his mouth if he dont stop. [To the woman] Dont you 
mind him, maam : he's mad with drink and devilment. I 
suppose theres no fake about this. Strapper. Who found 
her.^ 

Waggoner Jo. I did. Sheriff. Theres no fake about 
it. I came on her on the track round by Red Mountain. 
She was settin on the ground with the dead body on 
her lap, stupid-like. The horse was grazin on the other 
side of the road. 

The Sheriff [puzzled] Well, this is blamed queer. 
[To the woman] What call had you to take the horse 
from Elder Daniels' stable to find a doctor.'' Theres a 
doctor in the very next house. 

Blanco [mopping his dabbled red crest and trying to 
he ironically gay] Story simply wont wash, my angel. 
You got it from the man that stole the horse. He gave 
it to you because he was a softy and went to bits when 
you played off the sick kid on him. Well, I guess that 
clears me. I'm not that sort. Catch me putting my neck 
in a noose for anybody's kid ! 

The Foreman. Dont you go putting her up to what 
to say. She said she took it. 

The Woman. Yes: I took it from a man that met 
me. I thought God sent him to me. I rode here joy- 
fully thinking so all the time to myself. Then I noticed 
that the child was like lead in my arms. God would 
never have been so cruel as to send me the horse to dis- 
appoint me like that. 

Blanco. Just what He would do. 

Strapper. We aint got nothin to do with that. This 
is the man, aint he.'' [pointing to Blanco]. 

The Woman [pulling herself together after looking 
scaredly at Blanco, and then at the Sheriff and at the 
jury] No. 

The Foreman. You lie. 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 435 

The Sheriff. Youve got to tell us the truth. Thats 
the law, you know. 

The Woman. The man looked a bad man. He 
cursed me; and he cursed the child: God forgive him! 
But something came over him. I was desperate. I put 
the child in his arms ; and it got its little fingers down 
his neck and called him Daddy and tried to kiss him; 
for it was not right in its head with the fever. He said 
it was a little Judas kid, and that it was betraying him 
with a kiss, and that he'd swing for it. And then he 
gave me the horse, and went away crying and laughing 
and singing dreadful dirty wicked words to hymn tunes 
like as if he had seven devils in him. 

Strapper. She's lying. Give her the oath, George. 

The Sheriff. Go easy there. Youre a smart boy. 
Strapper; but youre not SheriiJ yet. This is my job. 
You just wait. I submit that we're in a difficulty here. 
If Blanco was the man, the lady cant, as a white woman, 
give him away. She oughtnt to be put in the position 
of having either to give him away or commit perjury. 
On the other hand, we dont want a horse-thief to get off 
through a lady's delicacy. 

The Foreman. No we dont; and we dont intend he 
shall. Not while I am foreman of this jury. 

Blanco [with intense expressioii] A rotten foreman! 
Oh, what a rotten foreman ! 

The Sheriff. Shut up, will you. Providence shows 
us a way out here. Two women saw Blanco with a 
horse. One has a delicacy about saying so. The other 
will excuse me saying that delicacy is not her strongest 
holt. She can give the necessary witness. Feemy Evans : 
youve taken the oath. You saw the man that took the 
horse. 

Feemy. I did. And he was a low-down rotten 
drunken lying hoimd that would go further to hurt a 
woman any day than to help her. And if he ever did a 



436 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

good action it was because he was too drunk to know 
what he was doing. So it's no harm to hang him. She 
said he cursed her and went away blaspheming and 
singing things that were not fit for the child to 
hear. 

Blanco [troubled] I didnt mean them for the child 
to hear, you venomous devil. 

The Sheriff. All thats got nothing to do with us. 
The question you have to answer is, was that man 
Blanco Posnet? 

The Woman. No. I say no. I swear it. Sheriff: 
dont hang that man : oh dont. You may hang me instead 
if you like : Ive nothing to live for now. You darent take 
her word against mine. She never had a child: I can 
see it in her face. 

Feemy [stung to the quick] I can hang him in spite 
of you, anyhow. Much good your child is to you now, 
lying there on Pug Jackson's bench ! 

Blanco [rushing at her with a shriek] I'll twist your 
heart out of you for that. [They seize him before he can 
reach her]. 

Feemy [mocking at him as he struggles to get at her] 
Ha, ha, Blanco Posnet. You cant touch me; and I can 
hang you. Ha, ha ! Oh, I'll do for you. I'll twist your 
heart and I'll twist your neck. [He is dragged back to 
the bar and leans on it, gasping and exhausted.] Give 
me the oath again. Elder. I'll settle him. And do you 
[to the woman] take your sickly face away from in front 
of me. 

Strapper. Just turn your back on her there, will 
you? 

The Woman. God knows I dont want to see her 
commit murder. [She folds her shawl over her head]. 

The Sheriff. Now, Miss Evans: cut it short. Was 
the prisoner the man you saw this morning or was he 
not? Yes or no? 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 437 

Feemy [a little hysterically] I'll tell you fast enough. 
Dont think I'm a softy. 

The Sheriff [losing patience] Here: weve had 
enough of this. You tell the truth, Feemy Evans; and 
let us have no more of your lip. Was the prisoner the 
man or was he not ? On your oath ? 

Feemy. On my oath and as I'm a living woman — 
[flinching] Oh God ! he felt the little child's hands on 
his neck — I cant [bursting into a flood of tears and 
scolding at the other woman] It's you with your sniv- 
elling face that has put me off it. [Desperately] No: 
it wasnt him. I only said it out of spite because he 
insulted me. May I be struck dead if I ever saw him 
with the horse! 

Everybody draws a long breath. Dead silence. 

Blanco [whispering at her] Softy! Cry-baby! 
Landed like me ! Doing what you never intended ! 
[Taking up his hat and speaking in his ordinary tone] 
1 presume I may go now, Sheriff. 

Strapper. Here, hold hard. 

The Foreman. Not if we know it, you dont. 

The Boys [barring the way to the door] You stay 
where you are. Stop a bit, stop a bit. Dont you be in 
such a hurry. Dont let him go. Not much. 

Blanco stands motionless, his eye fixed, thinking hard, 
and apparently deaf to what is going on. 

The Sheriff [rising solemnly] Silence there. Wait 
a bit. I take it that if the Sheriff is satisfied and the 
owner of the horse is satisfied, theres no more to be said. 
I have had to remark on former occasions that what is 
wrong with this court is that theres too many Sheriffs 
in it. To-day there is going to be one, and only one; 
and that one is your humble servant. I call that to the 
notice of the Foreman of the jury, and also to the no- 
tice of young Strapper. I am also the owner of the 
horse. Does any man say that I am not? [Silence]. 



438 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

Very well, then. In my opinion, to commandeer a horse 
for the purpose of getting a dying child to a doctor is 
not stealing, provided, as in the present case, that the 
horse is returned safe and sound. I rule that there has 
been no theft. 

Nestor. That aint the law. 

The Sheriff. I fine you a dollar for contempt of 
court, and will collect it myself off you as you leave the 
building. And as the boys have been disappointed of 
their natural sport, I shall give them a little fun by 
standing outside the door and taking up a collection for 
the bereaved mother of the late kid that shewed up 
Blanco Posnet. 

The Boys. A collection. Oh, I say ! Calls that 
sport? Is this a mothers' meeting.'' Well, I'll be jig- 
gered ! Where does the sport come in ? 

The Sheriff [continuing] The sport comes in, my 
friends, not so much in contributing as in seeing others 
fork out. Thus each contributes to the general enjoy- 
ment; and all contribute to his. Blanco Posnet: you go 
free under the protection of the Vigilance Committee for 
just long enough to get you out of this town, which is 
not a healthy place for you. As you are in a hurry, I'll 
sell you the horse at a reasonable figure. Now, boys, 
let nobody go out till I get to the door. The court is 
adjourned. [He goes out]. 

Strapper [to Feemy, as he goes to the door] I'm 
done with you. Do you hear? I'm done with you. [He 
goes out sulkily]. 

Feemy [calling after him] As if I cared about a 
stingy brat like you! Go back to the freckled may- 
pole you left for me: youve been fretting for her long 
enough. 

The Foreman [To Blanco, on his rvay out] A man 
like you makes me sick. Just sick. [Blanco makes no 
sign. The Foreman spits disgustedly, and follows Strap- 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 439 

per out. The Jurymen leave the box, except Nestor, rvho 
collapses in a drunken sleep]. 

Blanco [Suddenly rushing from the bar to the table 
and jumping up on it] Boys, I'm going to preach you 
a sermon on the moral of this day's proceedings. 

The Boys [crowding round him] Yes: lets have a 
sermon. Go ahead, Blanco. Silence for Elder Blanco. 
Tune the organ. Let us pray. 

Nestor [staggering out of his sleep] Never hold up 
your head in this town again. I'm done with you. 

Blanco [pointing inexorably to Nestor] Drunk in 
church. Disturbing the preacher. Hand him out. 

The Boys [chivying Nestor out] Now, Nestor, out- 
side. Outside, Nestor. Out you go. Get your subscrip- 
tion ready for the Sheriff. Skiddoo, Nestor. 

Nestor, Afraid to be hanged ! Afraid to be hanged ! 
[At the door] Coward! [He is thrown out]. 

Blanco. Dearly beloved brethren — 

A Boy. Same to you, Blanco. [Laughter]. 

Blanco. And many of them. Boys : this is a rotten 
world. 

Another Boy. Lord have mercy on us, miserable 
sinners. [More laughter]. 

Blanco [Forcibly] No: thats where youre wrong. 
Dont flatter yourselves that youre miserable sinners. 
Am I a miserable sinner .f* No: I'm a fraud and 
a failure. I started in to be a bad man like the 
rest of you. You all started in to be bad men 
or you wouldnt be in this jumped-up, jerked-off, 
hospital-turned-out camp that calls itself a town. I took 
the broad path because I thought I was a man and not 
a snivelling canting turning-the-other-cheek apprentice 
angel serving his time in a vale of tears. They talked 
Christianity to us on Sundays; but when they really 
meant business they told us never to take a blow without 
giving it back, and to get dollars. When they talked the 



440 The Sliewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

golden rule to me, I just looked at them as if they 
werent there, and spat. But when they told me to try 
to live my life so that I could always look my fellowman 
straight in the eye and tell him to go to hell, that 
fetched me. 

The Boys. Quite right. Good. Bully for you, 
Blanco, old son. Right good sense too. Aha-a-ah! 

Blanco. Yes; but whats come of it all? Am I a 
real bad man? a man of game and grit? a man that does 
what he likes and goes over or through other people 
to his own gain? or am I a snivelling cry-baby that let 
a horse his life depended on be took from him by a 
woman, and then sat on the grass looking at the rain- 
bow and let himself be took like a hare in a trap by 
Strapper Kemp: a lad whose back I or any grown man 
here could break against his knee? I'm a rottener fraud 
and failure than the Elder here. And youre all as rot- 
ten as me, or youd have lynched me. 

A Boy. Anything to oblige you, Blanco. 

Another. We can do it yet if you feel really bad 
about it. 

Blanco. No: the devil's gone ou" of you. We're all 
frauds. Theres none of us real good and none of us 
real bad. 

Elder Daniels. There is One above, Blanco. 

Blanco. What do you know about Him? you that 
always talk as if He never did anything without asking 
your rotten leave first? Why did the child die? Tell 
me that if you can. He cant have wanted to kill the 
child. Wliy did He make me go soft on the child if 
He was going hard on it Himself? Why should He go 
hard on the innocent kid and go soft on a rotten thing 
like me ? Why did I go soft myself ? Why did the Sher- 
iff go soft? Why did Feemy go soft? Whats this game 
that upsets our game? For seems to me theres two 
games bein played. Our game is a rotten game that 



The Shewlng-Up of Blanco Posnet 441 

makes me feel I'm dirt and that youre all as rotten dirt 
as me. T'other game may be a silly game; but it 
aint rotten. When the Sheriff played it he stopped 
being rotten. When Feemy played it the paint nearly 
drooped off her face. When I played it I cursed 
myself for a fool; but I lost the rotten feel all the 
same. 

Elder Daniels. It was the Lord speaking to your 
soul, Blanco. 

Blanco. Oh yes: you know all about the Lord, dont 
you.'' Youre in the Lord's confidence. He wouldnt for 
the world do anything to shock you, would He, Boozy 
dear ? Yah ! What about the croup ? It was early days 
when He made the croup, I guess. It was the best He 
could think of then ; but when it turned out wrong on 
His hands He made you and me to fight the croup for 
him. You bet He didnt make us for nothing; and He 
wouldnt have made us at all if He could have done His 
work without us. By Gum, that must be what we're for ! 
He'd never have made us to be rotten drunken black- 
guards like me, and good-for-nothing rips like Feemy. 
He made me because He had a job for me. He let me 
run loose til the job was ready; and then I had to come 
along and do it, hanging or no hanging. And I tell you 
it didnt feel rotten: it felt bully, just bully. Anyhow, 
I got the rotten feel off me for a minute of my life; and 
I'll go through fire to get it off me again. Look here! 
which of you will marry Feemy Evans ? 

The Boys [uproariously] Who speaks first? Who'll 
marry Feemy? Come along. Jack, Nows your chance, 
Peter. Pass along a husband for Feemy. Oh my ! 
Feemy ! 

Feemy [shortly] Keep your tongue off me, will you? 

Blanco. Feemy was a rose of the broad path, wasnt 
she? You all thought her the champion bad woman of 
this district. Well, she's a failure as a bad woman ; and 



442 The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 

I'm a failure as a bad man. So let Brother Daniels 
marry us to keep all the rottenness in the family. What 
do you say, Feemy.'' 

Feemy. Thank you; but when I marry I'll marry a 
man that could do a decent action without surprising 
himself out of his senses. Youre like a child with a 
new toy : you and your bit of human kindness ! 

The Woman. How many would have done it with 
their life at stake.'' 

Feemy. Oh well, if youre so much taken with him, 
marry him yourself. Youd be what people call a good 
wife to him, wouldnt you? 

The Woman. I was a good wife to the child's father. 
I dont think any woman wants to be a good wife twice 
in her life. I want somebody to be a good husband to 
me now. 

Blanco. Any offer, gentlemen, on that understand- 
ing? [The boys shake their heads]. Oh, it's a rotten 
game, our game. Here's a real good woman; and she's 
had enough of it, finding that it only led to being put 
upon. 

Hannah. Well, if there was nothing wrong in the 
world there wouldnt be anything left for us to do, would 
there ? 

Elder Daniels. Be of good cheer, brothers. Fight 
on. Seek the path. 

Blanco. No. No more paths. No more broad and 
narrow. No more good and bad. Theres no good and 
bad; but by Jiminy, gents, theres a rotten game, and 
theres a great game. I played the rotten game ; but the 
great game was played on me; and now I'm for the great 
game every time. Amen. Gentlemen: let us adjourn to 
the saloon. I stand the drinks. [He jumps down from 
the table]. 

The Boys. Right you are, Blanco. Drinks round. 
Come along, boys. Blanco's standing. Right along to 



The Shewing-Up of Blanco Posnet 443 

the Elder's. Hurrah! [They rush out, dragging the 
Elder rvith them]. 

Blanco \to Feemy, offering his hand] Shake, Feemy. 

Feemy. Get along, you blackguard. 

Blanco. It's come over me again, same as when the 
kid touched me. Shake, Feemy. 

Feemy. Oh well, here. [They shake hands]. 



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